Chinese Association for International Understanding

Environmental problems are the common challenge faced by human beings during the process of development. For the resolving of environmental problems, China has made great efforts and achieved significant results, which not only promoted the scientific development of China, but also made a positive contribution to the sustainable development of the world. In the assessment of the realization of Millennium Development Goals carried out in 2015, UN believed that China’s contribution occupied the largest share.

What’s more encouraging was that the concept of “the development of an ecological civilization” proposed by China attracted the attention of international community and was formally written into the resolution of the 27th council meeting of the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) in February 2013, thus offering a new direction for the development of the world. Many foreign experts and scholars also highly appreciate the job of environmental protection taken by China. “Although China was the most populous country in the world, she took the stance and responsibility of leading the world in terms of converting to eco-civilization”, said John B Cobb, who proposed the concept of “green GDP”.

In November 2012, the Eighteenth National Congress of the CPC gave strong emphasis on the development of an ecological civilization, incorporating it into the overall plan for advancing socialism with Chinese characteristics. After that, the Third Plenary Session of the 18th CPC Central Committee proposed that the development of an eco-conscious civilization must evolve around the building of a beautiful China. The Fourth Plenary Session of the 18th CPC Central Committee claimed to speed up the building of a legal system for protecting ecological civilization, and to protect ecological environment with strict laws and regulations.

In October 2015, the Fifth Plenary Session of the 18th CPC Central Committee adopted the Recommendations for the 13th Five-Year Plan for Economic and Social Development, proposing the guiding thought, fundamental principles, objectives and requirements, development concepts and major initiatives of social and economic development of China in the next five years. The Recommendations used an independent chapter introducing “green development”, making strategic layouts on the development of ecological civilization and environmental protection, and incorporated “green development” into the five concepts for development. For improving the weak link of ecological environment which hinders the building of a moderately prosperous society in an all-round way, the Recommendations set the objective of “comprehensively improve the ecological and environmental quality” by 2020.

Three programmatic documents published in 2015 are interrelated and in coordination with each other. They specified the concepts, principles, objectives and tasks of eco-environment governance of China in next five years or a longer period, and were the top-level design and route chart for the green development and ecological development of China.

National and Party leaders of China attached great importance to environmental protection. President Xi Jinping put forward a series of important new concepts, ideas and strategies on the development of an ecological civilization and the strengthening of environmental protection, and the publicized speeches, addresses and instructions of President Xi Jinping on this issue was as more as some 80 times. Premier Li Keqiang and Vice Premier Zhang Gaoli also made specific instructions and requirements on this issue for many times. We can say that the understanding of the Chinese Government on the development of an ecological civilization and environmental protection is deepening, with their work intensity unprecedented and work process accelerating.

During the twelfth five-year plan period (2010-2015), the most important initiatives taken by the Chinese Government include: implemented the Action Plan for Air Pollution Prevention and Control since 2013, including 35 measures in 10 aspects for air pollution controlling with PM2.5 and PM10 as the priorities; in April 2015, the Government launched the Action Plan for Water Pollution Prevention and Control, announcing 238 measures in 10 aspects for water pollution controlling. These ambitious pollution controlling programs were unprecedented in the history of human beings.

Statistics were most persuasive in proving the effects of these efforts. By the end of 2015, the daily sewage treatment capacity of urban areas of China has surged to 182 million tons from 121 million tons in 2010, making China among the countries with the world’s largest sewage treatment capacity. The total capacity of coal fired power plants which were equipped with desulphurization facilities has increased from 530 million kilowatt to 890 million kilowatt, with their share in the coal fired power plants improved from 83 percent to more than 99 percent. The total capacity of coal fired power plants which were equipped with de-nitration facilities has surged from 80 million kilowatt to 830 million kilowatt, with their share in the coal fired power plants improved from 12 percent to 92 percent. The total area of sintering machines of iron & steel companies which were equipped with desulphurization facilities has grown from 29 thousand square meters to 138 thousand square meters, with their share in total area of sintering machines grown from 19 percent to 88 percent. The capacity of modern dry process cement production lines equipped with de-nitration facilities has surged from 0 to 1.6 billion tons, with their share in the total capacity of modern dry process cement production lines improved to 92 percent. In addition, China has constructed the largest air quality monitoring network in developing countries, with 338 cities at prefecture level or above all boasted the monitoring capacity for six most important indicators of air quality like PM 2.5. No other country in the world has invested so large and carried out so huge project quantities at such a short time like China.

The role of environmental protection in forcing the adjustment of industrial structure was becoming increasingly prominent. During the period of 2011 to 2014, China eliminated the production capacity of 23.65 million kilowatt thermal power, 77 million tons of iron, 77 million tons of steel, 600 million tons of cement, 29 million tons of paper, 32 million standard pieces of leather, 10 billion meters of printing and dyeing. The objectives of phasing out backward production capacity in major industries during the 12th five-year plan period were all completed a year ahead of schedule. The circumstance of eco-friendship of industries has been improving. For instance, the emissions of sulfur dioxide and nitrogen oxide of the thermal power industry have declined by 47 percent and 50 percent respectively, and the emissions of COD and ammonia nitrogen of per unit of industrial added value of the country have decreased by 42 percent and 48 percent respectively.

These efforts and effects were converted directly into the improvement of environmental quality. During the 12th five-year plan period, four total volume control quotas for pollutants (COD and ammonia nitrogen of water, and sulfur dioxide and nitrogen oxide of air) raised by the Chinese Government all went beyond the previous standard. Among the effects of emission controlling, the most distinctive ones include: the area of acid rain has decreased to the level of the 1990s, the cross section area ratio of water quality below class V has fallen sharply from 44 percent of 2001 to about 9 percent now, dropping by 80 percent.

China was the world’s first developing country which proposed to control PM 2.5. In 2014, the average concentration of PM 2.5 in the first group of 74 cities which implemented the revised air quality standard declined by 11.1 percent compared with 2013. And in 2015, this number reached 14.1 percent compared with 2014, thus making positive achievements.

While resolving environmental problems at home, China also made great efforts in dealing with global environmental issues and has made great contribution. For instance, in the concerted efforts of the world in controlling ozone-depleting substance, the contribution of China in reducing the use of ozone-depleting substance occupied more than 50 percent in the developing world, making China the largest contributor in the action of protecting the ozone layer.

In addition, China established a national committee on biodiversity conservation, published the China National Biodiversity Conservation Strategy and National Plan (2011-2030), and launched the event of the “United Nations Decade on Biodiversity—China in Action”. China has established an in-situ conservation network system for biodiversity with nature reserves as the main force. The total area of various types of nature reserves of China amounted to 1,470,000 square kilometers, which accounted for 14.8 percent of the total land area of the country and higher than the world average level of 12.7 percent. 85 percent of terrestrial ecosystem types and wildlife have been effectively protected. With the efforts of conservation, panda, a mammal endemic to China, has turned from an endangered species to a vulnerable species. More than 40 mammal species have turned from “critically endangered” to “endangered” species or from “endangered” to “vulnerable” species.

China will adhere to the basic state policy of conserving resources and protecting the environment, stick to sustainable development, firmly take a road of civilized development featuring a well developed productive force, an affluent life and a sound eco-environment, accelerate the development of a conservation minded and environmental friendly society, advance modernization featuring harmonious development between man and nature, promote the construction of a beautiful China, thus making new contributions to global ecological security.

Taking the improvement of environmental quality as the core and resolving major problems in terms of eco-environment as the focus, China will strengthen the protection of ecological environment, improve the efficiency of resource utilization, provide people with more high quality ecological products, and promote collaboratively the well-being of people, the prosperity and sound environment of the country. China will also innovate the ideas and methods of environment governance, implement the most stringent environmental protection system, assume primary responsibility of polluters, thus building an environmental governance system integrating the roles of the government, enterprises and the public, and achieving the overall improvement of environmental quality.

Over the next five years, China should aim to ensure that water consumption, energy consumption, and carbon dioxide emissions per unit of GDP are cut by 23%, 15%, and 18% respectively, and that forest coverage reaches 23.04%. We should also make it our aim, within this timeframe, to develop and use energy and resources much more efficiently and make improvements to the quality of ecosystems and the environment. In particular, we should strive for major progress in the control and prevention of air pollution and see to it that the air quality of cities at and above the prefectural level is good or excellent for 80% of the year.

For the realization of the above objectives, the environmental protection of China will focus on planning and carrying out job in six aspects. The first is to take the improvement of environmental quality as the core, and firmly implement three action plans, namely the pollution prevention and controlling in terms of air, water and soil. The second is by taking advantage of the driving force brought by the reforming of basic system of environmental governance to accelerate the formation of an endogenous mechanism for green development. The third is starting from the establishment and improvement of an environmental pollution prevention system, strive to optimize the spatial pattern of the development of an ecological civilization. The fourth is to actively promote and strengthen structural reform of the supply front with the leading roles of law and standard. The fifth is taking ecological environment security as the base line to strengthen the prevention and controlling of environmental risks. The sixth is taking the path of synergetic governance of pluralism to advance the production-method and green living style. Among the above measures, the most important ones are the reform of environmental governance system and the improvement of the environmental governance capacity. It is extremely important and urgent in the near future for environmental protection of China to strengthen the construction of environmental legal system and insist on protecting environment according to and by law.

Illegal practices in terms of environmental protection constitute a very prominent problem in China and the core reasons of that include: first, the enforcement of laws of environmental protection is not stringent enough, and the cost of breaking the law is very low and the expense of obeying the law is high; second, there are local interventions to some extent.

In regard to these problems, the Chinese Government has adopted a series of targeted measures. Two newly revised laws, namely the Environmental Protection Law and Law on the Prevention and Control of Atmospheric Pollution were put into practice respectively in 2015 and 2016. Changes brought by the implementation of the two laws include the strengthening of authoritativeness of environmental laws, the improvement of cost of breaking laws, and the effective implementation of environmental protection responsibilities of local governments.

In the press conference of NPC and CPPCC of 2015, Chinese Premier Li Keqiang emphasized specifically: “This year our focus will be to ensure the full implementation of the newly-revised environmental protection law. All acts of illegal production and emissions will be brought to justice and held accountable. We need to make the cost for doing so too high to bear. More support will be given to environmental law enforcement departments, including capacity building, and no one is allowed to use his power to meddle with law enforcement in this regard. The law enforcement departments should also have the courage to take charge and fulfill their due responsibilities. Laxity in law enforcement will be dealt with and dereliction of duty or abuse of office will be handled in accordance with the law. We must ensure that the law will work as a powerful and effective tool in fighting pollution instead of being soft as cotton candy.”

The authoritativeness of Environmental Protection Law depends on strict enforcement. In 2015, the environmental protection departments in the whole country totally organized 1.77 million inspections, investigated and punished 191,000 various law-breaking enterprises, banned 20,000 enterprises, ordered 34,000 companies to cease production, ordered 89000 enterprises to make corrections or equipment modification within limited time schedule. By the end of 2015, environmental protection departments at all levels issued consecutive daily fines in 715 cases, with the total amount of fines amounted to 569 million yuan RMB, implemented close-down and sequestrate in 4191 cases, ordered shutdown or cut down production in 3106 cases, issued more than 97,000 decisions of administrative penalty with a total sum of 4.25 billion yuan RMB, up by 34 percent. Supporting interaction between administrative law enforcement and criminal law enforcement in terms of environmental protection was strengthened－by the end of 2015, there were 2079 cases involving administrative detention and 1685 cases were transferred to prosecuting authority for suspected environmental pollution crimes.

In the fulfilling of the responsibilities of local governments in terms of environmental protection, in 2015, environmental protection departments all over the country carried out comprehensive supervision to 163 cities, organized public interview with and warning to 31 municipal governments which are with serious environmental problems in their jurisdictions, implemented limited approval to regional new projects to more than 20 cities and counties, carried out listed supervision on 176 major issues. Among the above measures, the Ministry of Environmental Protection organized public interview and warning to the mayors of 15 cities and achieved significant effects. These measures effectively promoted the fulfilling of responsibilities of local governments, and accelerated the resolution of a series of principal environmental problems.

In the future, the dependence of environmental protection on macro-policy will become more and more prominent. The foundation for maintaining the effectiveness of macro-policy was rule of law or making abiding by law a conscious practice. With the perfection and strict enforcement of laws, China will cast due punishment on environmental law breaking practices, intake the consequence of environmental pollution into the cost of enterprises, and promote the establishment of a fair and regulatory market competition system.

Meanwhile, during the 13th five-year plan period (2016-2020), China will carry out a very important environmental system reform-the vertical administration of the monitoring, supervision and law enforcement of environmental protection institutions at the provincial level. Major objectives of this reform include: improve the uniformity, authoritativeness and effectiveness of environmental monitoring and supervision; and work from the institutional and mechanism dimensions to resolve problems existed in some local areas, namely focus more on development and less on environmental protection, interference in environmental protection monitoring, supervision and law enforcement, poor law observance, loose administration and illegal judicature.

Generally speaking, environmental protection in China is in an important period of strategic opportunities for its development, as well as in a critical period of arduous advancement. Involving over a billion people, the modernization drive of China features huge scale, fast pace and tight schedule, hence there is an environmental pressure higher than any other country. Taking the improvement of environmental quality as the core, China should maintain its strategic concentration, and refrain from one shot deal or inaction. Instead, we should adopt the most stringent environmental protection system and fight a protracted war in terms of environmental protection. From the perspective of tactics, we should define distinctively the different objectives at different periods and stages, and put forward the solution of environmental problems step by step by fighting one battle after another.