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October 9, 2022, Beijing Beihai Park under the blue sky and white clouds. Photo by Beijing News reporter Wang Fei
The report of the 20th National Congress of the Communist Party of China mentioned that we adhere to the concept that lucid waters and lush mountains are golden mountains and silver mountains, adhere to the integrated protection and systematic management of mountains, waters, forests, lakes, grasses and sands, the institutional system of ecological civilization is more sound, the ecological environmental protection has undergone historic, turning and overall changes, and our motherland has bluer sky, greener mountains and clearer water. This has also become the fundamental compliance and action guide for carrying out ecological environmental protection work in the coming period.
On October 21, Vice Minister Zhai Qing, deputy to the 20th National Congress of the Communist Party of China and member of the leading party group of the Ministry of Ecology and Environment, said at a press conference with the theme of "building a beautiful China where man and nature live in harmony" that in the past decade, the construction of ecological civilization and ecological environmental protection on the mainland have undergone historic, turning and overall changes, which are mainly reflected in the "three unprecedented" of great determination, great intensity and great results.
Great determination: strict ecological and environmental law enforcement is consistent
Ten years ago, the mainland's total economic output surpassed Japan and ranked second in the world.
However, the world development pattern has also entered a process of rapid change and reorganization, and the mainland's economic and social development must not only cope with external pressures of changing international environment and endless crises, but also face the inherent challenges of tightening domestic resource and environmental constraints, serious ecological degradation, and concentrated outbreaks of various social contradictions. The environmental problems that have emerged successively in the process of industrialization in developed countries over the past 200 years have occurred intensively in the form of structure, composite and compression on the mainland.
Since 2012, party and state leaders have accurately grasped the new world, national and party conditions, stood at the height of the sustainable development of the Chinese nation, judged the hour and sized up the situation and put forward the overall requirements for vigorously promoting the construction of ecological civilization, emphasizing that the construction of ecological civilization should be placed in a prominent position and included in the overall layout of socialist modernization.
Looking at the policy addresses of ruling parties around the world, environmental protection, pollution control, ecological construction, and green development have been elevated to ecological civilization theories and become the ruling party's governance line and guiding principles.
In the past ten years, especially during the period of large-scale investment in environmental governance infrastructure, strict ecological and environmental law enforcement will inevitably bring pressure to the economic development of some places. Especially in recent years, due to the impact of international geopolitics and the new crown pneumonia epidemic, economic and social development has faced severe challenges. Many people are worried that pollution prevention and ecological environmental protection will aggravate the downward pressure on the economy, and have raised whether environmental law enforcement can be relaxed, slowed down and relaxed.
In response to such voices, the Party Central Committee, the State Council, the Ministry of Ecology and Environment and other relevant departments have repeatedly responded clearly, "the ecological environmental protection work will maintain the same direction and undiminished strategic determination"; Repeated orders reiterated that "we will never go back to the old road of developing at the expense of the ecological environment and developing one place at a time."
It is precisely this resolute attitude from the whole country that makes those who are lucky or lax dare not take a step beyond the minefield. Thought is the guide to action, and unprecedented great determination has inspired unprecedented great power to promote the continuous improvement of ecological environment quality.
On April 26, 2022, the cruise ship sailed through the Canal Business District in Tongzhou District, Beijing. Under the guidance of the new development concept, the ancient Grand Canal has been revitalized. Photo: Xinhua
Great strength: The ability to protect the ecological environment has been comprehensively strengthened
In order to respond to the public's expectations for a better environment, the mainland has made all-round efforts in ideology, law, system, organization and work style, and strengthened the protection of the ecological environment in an all-round, all-regional and whole-process manner.
At the national level, a number of ecological and environmental laws and regulations have been revised and promulgated, so that the environmental protection law can truly "grow teeth". The newly revised Environmental Protection Law in 2015 introduced strong penalties such as daily penalties, closure and rectification, and pollution punishment, which greatly increased the cost of environmental violations and effectively curbed the situation of lax law enforcement.
At the local level, we should fully implement the principle of "the party and government have the same responsibility, one post and two responsibilities" and "environmental protection must be managed in the management of development, and environmental protection must be managed in the management of the industry", ideologically solve the problem that leading cadres at all levels did not attach importance to environmental protection in the past, and resolutely implement the environmental protection responsibilities of local party committees and governments.
At the same time, it has comprehensively launched the three major defense battles of blue sky, clear water and pure land, won seven landmark major battles such as "diesel truck pollution control, urban black and odorous water body treatment, comprehensive treatment of the Bohai Sea, protection and restoration of the Yangtze River, protection of water sources, and agricultural and rural pollution control", and carried out four special actions of "prohibiting the entry of foreign garbage, cracking down on illegal transfer and dumping of hazardous waste, strengthening the discharge of waste incineration power generation industry up to standard, and supervision and inspection of 'Green Shield' nature reserve".
In terms of innovating ecological environmental protection mechanisms and organizational forms, we have coordinated and carried out multiple rounds of central environmental protection inspections around the key tasks of the pollution prevention and control battle and other key areas, and promoted the solution of a large number of long-term "old and difficult" problems of the ecological environment that have not been solved.
Moreover, environmental protection capabilities have been comprehensively strengthened from the aspects of vertical reform of environmental protection agencies, construction of environmental monitoring networks, capacity building of environmental monitoring law enforcement, support of ecological environment science and technology, and improvement of environmental protection law enforcement hardware facilities.
In order to gnaw many hard bones in the field of ecological environment, party committees and governments at all levels adhere to the management of pollution according to law, scientific pollution control, and precise pollution control, and the strength of investment and the strictness of measures are unique in the world. For the large-scale air pollution problems in Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei and surrounding key areas, which have attracted much attention, since 2017 alone, 50,000 backbone environmental protection forces have been coordinated for five consecutive years, and 105 rounds of pollution prevention and control supervision and assistance have been carried out after more than 1,300 days of stubble pressing, and more than 280,000 air pollution problems have been solved.
Behind all the achievements, all vividly explain the unprecedented efforts to win the battle against pollution and resolutely curb the spread of pollution in the past decade.
May 15, 2022, a view of the Tuotuo River in Shijiazhuang, Hebei. In recent years, remarkable results have been achieved in the management of the ecological environment of the Haihe River Basin, the largest river system in North China. Photo: Xinhua
Great results: to become a leader in the construction of global ecological civilization
After ten years of continuous efforts, the quality of the national ecological environment has been comprehensively improved, the air quality index and water environment quality index, which are closest to public life, have improved significantly, and the people's sense of ecological environment quality, happiness and security has been significantly enhanced.
By the end of 2021, among the surface water assessment sections of 3,641 countries in the mainland, the proportion of sections with excellent water quality (class I~III.) was 84.9%, which was close to the level of developed countries; The area of nature reserves at all levels and types has accounted for 18% of the country's land area, and the populations of more than 300 rare and endangered wild animals and plants have been restored and increased; The green and low-carbon transformation has achieved remarkable results, with an average annual energy consumption of 3% supporting an average annual economic growth of 6.6% in the past decade.
The pollution issue that most nerves the public and arouses strong concern is smog pollution. People are still haunted by the long-lasting, widespread and severe smog pollution that occurred a decade ago.
According to the Bulletin on the State of the Environment issued by the Ministry of Ecology and Environment, in 2013, only 4.1% of the 74 cities monitored in accordance with the newly revised Ambient Air Quality Standards (GB3095-2012) met the standards. By 2021, the average annual concentration of PM2.5 in Beijing dropped by 63% compared with 2013, reaching the secondary air quality standard.
The unprecedented results of ecological environment governance in the past decade have promoted the mainland to become an important participant, contributor and leader in the construction of global ecological civilization.
Joyce Msuya, acting director of the United Nations Environment Programme, said: "China has shown unparalleled leadership in tackling domestic air pollution, and is committed to helping other countries step up their actions while driving continuous improvement in its own air quality." China leads the way, inspiring global action to save millions of lives. ”
Everything that has passed is a prologue. The successful experience of ecological civilization construction and ecological environmental protection in the past decade will provide useful reference and strong impetus for in-depth fight against pollution in the new era, achieving the goal of carbon peaking and carbon neutrality on schedule, and implementing high-quality development of green and low-carbon transformation.
At present, we must still adhere to our original intention, keep the same direction, and undiminished intensity, continue to write an unprecedented new chapter in the realization of Chinese-style modernization in which man and nature live in harmony, and contribute China's strength to building a community with a shared future for mankind and a clean and beautiful world.
Written by / Yang Pingjian (Chinese Academy of Environmental Sciences)
Editor / Xu Qiuying
Proofreader / Lin Zhao