There are more lottery stores than 7-Eleven convenience stores in Taiwan only 10 years since the lottery system’s inception in 2006.
Taiwan Lottery Co (台灣彩券), a subsidiary of CTBC Financial Holding Co (中信金控) that was commissioned to operate the lotteries, has 5,727 retailers nationwide.
President Chain Store Corp (統一超商), which operates the convenience store chain, said on its Web site that there were 5,107 7-Eleven stores in Taiwan as of December last year.
Lottery retailers are located from northern Taiwan in New Taipei City’s Sanjhih District (三芝) to the southernmost tip of the island in Hengchun Township (恆春), Pingtung County. They can also be found on Orchid Island (Lanyu, 蘭嶼) in Taitung County in southeastern Taiwan and in remote mountain areas, such as Lishan (梨山) in the central mountain range.
Taiwan Lottery sold a total of NT$1.18 trillion (US$38.9 billion) lottery tickets from 2007 to the end of October of last year, its Web site said.
Established as a public welfare program, the lottery has helped more than 4.5 million underprivileged people through more than 700 public welfare and charity projects as of October last year, the company said.
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