On April 1, 2006, Mr. Hu Jintao, General Secretary of CCCPC and President of the People’s Republic of China took part in voluntary afforestation activities with the representatives of all walks of life in Beijing. He stressed that we should persist in doing well our work on the conservation and development of ecological environment and create good production and living environment for the public.

Photo of Xinhua News Agency

During April 17~18, 2006, Premier Wen Jiabao made an important speech at the 6th National Congress on Environmental Protection held by the State Council in Beijing. In his speech, Premier Wen pointed out that we should put environmental protection at more important strategic position and do well environmental protection work in the spirit of highly responsible for our country, nation and future generations and promote comprehensive, coordinated and sustainable economic and social development. Photo of China Environment News

The Central Committee of Communist Party of China (CCCPC) and State Council attach great importance to environmental protection. In a meeting of the Standing Committee of the Political Bureau of CCCPC, General Secretary Hu Jintao and the participants discussed the philosophy of environmental protection work in the new era. Mr. Hu has given important instructions several times on strengthening environmental protection work. On April 1, 2006, General Secretary Hu Jintao took part in voluntary afforestation activities with representatives of all walks of life in Beijing. On this occasion, he stressed that Party committees and governments at all levels shall, from the big picture of implementing the outlook on scientific development in an all round way, continuously do well the work on the protection and development of ecological environment, make more efforts in addressing the pre-eminent issues in this field and create a good living and production environment for the public. With long-term efforts of the entire society, we will have the beautiful environment with blue sky, green land, clean air and water and enjoy the harmony between man and nature. The State Council issued the Decision on Implementing the Outlook on Scientific Development and Strengthening Environmental Protection (hereinafter referred to as the Decision) and held the Sixth National Conference on Environmental Protection. Premier Wen Jiabao and Vice Premier Zeng Peiyan attended the meeting and made important speeches. In his speech, Premier Wen stressed that the key to doing well environmental protection work under new situations is that we should accelerate three transformations: The first “transformation” concerns the change from economy-centered development to equal attention on both environmental protection and economic development. The second is the change from delayed environmental protection after economic development to simultaneous environmental protection and economic development. The third transformation is the change from sole administrative measures to an integrated approach of legal, economic, technical and necessary administrative measures to address environmental problems. The three transformations are guiding, strategic and historic transformations, indicating that environmental protection work in China enters a new stage where environmental protection optimizes economic growth. Our goal is to develop an environment-friendly society; our task is to facilitate the historical transformations. Our overall thinking is promoting the work in an all round way with some breakthroughs. Our main measures are focusing on implementation, practical and detailed activities at grassroot levels.

The Outline of the 11th Five-Year Plan for National Economic and Social Development approved by the 14th Meeting of the Standing Committee of the tenth NPC has identified the compulsory targets, that is, energy consumption per unit GDP will reduce by 20% and total emissions of major pollutants reduce by 10% by the year 2010. It puts energy saving and emission reduction at a pre-eminent and strategic position.

Guided by the outlook on scientific development, each department and local government have seriously carried out the plan of CCCPC on environmental protection work in the new era and made increasing efforts over the past year. As a result, 29 provinces (autonomous regions or municipalities under the State Council) have held conference on environmental protection. 26 provinces (autonomous regions or municipalities under the State Council) have issued their documents on the implementation of the Decision. Consequently, the Decision and the spirit of the Sixth National Conference on Environmental Protection are under in-depth implementation. Entrusted by the State Council, SEPA has signed emission reduction responsibility documents with each provincial level people’s government and six big power corporations including Huaneng Company to divide the emission reduction targets. With the approval of the State Council, National Meeting on the Prevention and Control of Atmospheric Pollution and National Teleconference on the Prevention and Control of Water Pollution were held with steady progress in pollution control. The installed capacity of coal-fueled power plants put into operation with desulphurization devices was 104 million kW, more than two times of the amount of previous 10 years being 46 million kW, marking a historic breakthough. The authority has earnestly carried out EIA system and the “Three synchronizations” system. It has carried out comprehensive streamlining activities on new fix-assets investment projects and phased out a range of out-of-date technologies, equipment and productivity. It continued the special environmental protection campaigns on cracking down enterprises that illegally discharge pollutants and safeguarding public health and has investigated and punished a number of environmental infringements threatening public interests. Some big environmental accidents with strong social concerns and complaints such as the ManniuRiver pollution accident in JilinProvince, XinqiangRiver arsenic pollution accident in Yueyang City, Hunan Province and lead poisoning accident in Hui County of Gansu Province have been handled properly. Activities in such areas as ecological conservation, supervision on the safety of nuclear and radiation and international environmental cooperation have been deepened. The “Five developments” in thinking, organization, work style, capacity and system in all units in the field of environmental protection have enjoyed further progress. The capacity in guaranteeing environmental infrastructure and workforce has been strengthened. SEPA has successfully held National Conference on Environmnetal Science and Technology. Uniting all social forces and mobilizing the initiatives of each stakeholder, we have created a new situation where environmental protection is facilitated by all parties.

In 2006, with 10.7% growth of GDP and 9.3% growth of total energy consumption compared with that of 2005, the overall environmental quality of China remained stable. The water quality of Pearl River and Yangtze River was good. The Songhua River, Yellow River and Huaihe River were subject to intermediate pollution. The Liaohe River and Haihe River were under heavy pollution.The overall water quality of collective drinking water sources of major cities was good. Coastal waters of the South China Sea and Yellow Sea enjoyed good water quality. While coastal waters of BohaiSea were under slight pollution and coastal waters of East China Sea under intermediate pollution. Distant sea waters enjoyed good quality. The overall urban air quality had some improvement compared with that of 2005. Air quality of major cities maintained stable. So did acid rain regions. Acid rain areas mainly concentrated on the regions south to the Yangtze River and east to Sichuan Province and YunnanProvince. Cities across China enjoyed relatively good acoustic environment. Radiation environmental quality was good.