Commercial Press of China has published a Chinese-Portuguese dictionary of intermediate size, the first in China, the China News Service reports.

The state-run news agency says there are nearly 250 million speakers of Portuguese in the world, and that demand for such a dictionary has increased as social, cultural and commercial exchanges between China and lusophone countries have increased.

The report says the dictionary contains nearly 50,000 entries, including idioms, proverbs and aphorisms, and notes the differences between Portuguese as spoken in Portugal and Portuguese as spoken in Brazil.

The reference book was among 10 must-haves recommended by Commercial Press of China last month, the China News Service says.