BEIJING - China published a wide-ranging plan to tackle environmental degradation on Wednesday, addressing an issue that has become a threat to the country's breakneck economic growth, its social stability and its citizens' health.
Chinese officials frequently pledge tighter regulations and tougher punishments to try to curb pollution, but analysts were hopeful that the document issued by the State Council, or cabinet, would carry more weight.
"This carries all the things that SEPA wants to do but could not do, either because of institutional conflicts with other ministries or things they couldn't push through as quickly through legislation," said Zhang Jianyu, China manager of the US-based organisation Environmental Defense.
SEPA is the State Environmental Protection Administration, China's top environmental body.
Cities throughout China are choked with car exhaust and factory pollution and many of its rivers are poisoned, but the drive to clean up the environment has been getting more attention since an explosion at a chemical plant last November poisoned drinking water for millions.
The blast in northeastern Jilin poured cancer-causing benzene compounds into the Songhua River, caused water supplies for millions to be cut off and sent a toxic slick toward the Russian border, turning the spill into an international incident.
The State Council regulations focus on water, air and soil pollution and set targets to improve the environment in heavily polluted cities and regions by 2010 and across the country by 2020.
They also aim to take environmental factors into account when evaluating local officials, who have been accused of stonewalling environmental initiatives in an effort to instead focus on economic growth.
"Leading officials and other relevant government officials will be punished for making wrong decisions that cause serious environmental accidents and for gravely obstructing environmental law enforcement," said the regulations, which were printed in domestic media.
SEPA's head was forced to resign following the Songhua spill.
Its new chief, Zhou Shengxian, acknowledged that environmental problems have also become a trigger for social unrest.
"The issue of pollution has become a 'blasting fuse' of social instability," Zhou said in comments carried by the official Xinhua news agency.
Last year there were at least three riots in the eastern province of Zhejiang alone that were serious enough to force the closure of polluting chemical and battery factories.
Despite signs the government is beginning to take environmental degradation more seriously - it named 11 companies for serious pollution earlier this month - the regulations warned there were more problems to come.
"In the next 15 years, the fight against pollution will become ever more arduous as the nation's economy is expected to quadruple," the document said.
Story by Lindsay Beck
REUTERS NEWS SERVICE
