In a forum held Sunday to mark the opening of Taipei City Government's "e-Taipei" exhibition, Taipei Mayor Ma Ying-jeou said that municipal authorities would prioritize the establishment of public Internet access kiosks, and set a target of 800 such booths by the end of 2002.

Earlier this month, Chunghwa Telecom, the state-owned telephone company, unveiled plans to create a network of 1,100 Web-capable kiosks around Taiwan.

The show at City Hall is organized by the Taipei Information Center and sponsored by IBM-Taiwan. It will be open to the public until April 25.

Since January, Taipei City Government has been offering every city resident three hours of free Internet training as part of Mayor Ma's "Easy City" project, which aims to bring low-cost Web access to residents of the capital.

During last weekend's forum, Ma estimated that around 75 percent of the city's 870,000 households own a computer.

Taipei has been offering free e-mail accounts to locals since October, 1999. Almost 100,000 residents have so far taken advantage of the service.

Some city government bureaus now offer services over the Net. By using the Web, it is possible to ascertain if a particular plot of land is zoned for commercial, residential or industrial use. Online, the process takes a few minutes; off-line, it takes at least two working days.