Washington, Mar 14 : To overcome the ongoing financial crisis, The Washington Post is taking another step toward trimming the size of its newspaper.

The Post is folding its stand-alone Business section into the A section six days a week and drastically reducing the publication of stock tables.

Bringing financial news inside the A section will reduce the newspaper from five to four sections Monday through Saturday, not counting weekly feature sections such as Health, Food and Home.

Business will remain a separate section on Sunday. The changes take effect from March 30, the paper said.

"From a reader-experience point of view, having business and economic news in the A section -- overlapping with national, international, political and policy news -- makes a great deal of sense," Executive Editor Marcus Brauchli said.

But he did not dispute the fact that the loss of a section would mean less prominence for many business stories.

This is the latest move by The Post, which has been shrinking its print product and its staff numbers, like most newspapers across the US.

Earlier, The Post eliminated the Sunday Source and Book World sections and combined the Sunday Arts and Style sections.

In place of the weekly Washington Business section on Mondays, Brauchli plans a daily half-page of stories devoted to local business matters.

The changes will save The Post money on newsprint costs, Brauchli said, but will not affect the space devoted to national and foreign news in the A section. (ANI)