Ministry of Environmental Protection: China's Water Pollution Prevention and Control Action Plan is being drawn up

　　Zhai Qing, Vice Minister of the Ministry of Environmental Protection, said today that the Ministry of Environmental Protection, together with relevant departments, is working out the Action Plan for Water Pollution Prevention and Control. The core of this document is to improve the quality of water environment, focusing on two ends. One is resolutely harnessing the heavily polluted areas, the other is rivers and lakes with better water quality. They should be resolutely protected and not be polluted before harnessing.

　　The Information Office of the State Council held a press conference today to introduce the progress of environmental protection work in 2013.

　　Zhai Qing said that compared with air pollution control, water pollution prevention and control has done more work in recent years, especially through the three "five-year plan". Since the "Ninth Five-Year Plan" and especially during the "Eleventh Five-Year Plan", the State Council has intensified the assessment of the completion of planning tasks and increased investment. It should be said that the water environment problem is basically a problem. It is stable, especially in key river basins and seven major river systems. Including the "three rivers and three lakes" which have been heavily polluted in the past few years, there have been great changes in these years.

　　Zhai Qing pointed out that at the same time, the water environment situation is still very serious, mainly in several aspects:

　　一、The total discharge of water pollutants is still huge. Chemical oxygen demand (COD) emissions are about 24 million tons, and ammonia nitrogen emissions are about 2.45 million tons. What is this concept? This emissions far exceed the current environmental capacity. Experts estimate that the total amount of these must be reduced by 30% - 50%, so that our water environment will have a fundamental change.

　　二、It is because the pollution of groundwater, including groundwater, has not been effectively controlled.

　　三、Some rivers, especially in rural areas, or rivers and forks which are closely related to people's lives, are still seriously polluted.

　　四、There are still many deficiencies in the management of water environment.

　　Zhai Qing said that in order to effectively solve these problems, we will work with relevant departments to prepare the Water Pollution Prevention and Control Action Plan in accordance with the requirements of the State Council, which will be submitted to the State Council for consideration after further modification and improvement. The core of this document is to improve the quality of water environment. The focus is on two sides. One is resolutely harnessing the heavily polluted areas, the other is rivers and lakes with better water quality. We should resolutely protect them and not first pollute them before harnessing them.

　　Zhai Qing introduced that in terms of specific measures, the first is to drastically reduce the discharge of industrial pollution; the second is to manage the discharge of urban living pollution; and the third is to control rural rivers and forks. Like the Atmospheric Action Plan, we strive to make breakthroughs in responsibilities, tasks, measures and institutional mechanisms to better and continuously improve the quality of the water environment.