China's ecological environment improves in 2019

Aerial photo taken on April 22, 2020 shows Chang'an Park in Xi'an, northwest China's Shaanxi Province. In recent years, Xi'an has continued improving the quality of the ecological environment by means of new green space parks and comprehensive treatment of water bodies. (Xinhua/Zhang Bowen)

The share of good air quality days in China's 337 cities at or above the prefecture level hit 82 percent in 2019.

China saw progress in ecological environment protection as the quality of air, surface water and oceans improved in 2019, according to a report on environmental protection.

The share of good air quality days in China's 337 cities at or above the prefecture level hit 82 percent in 2019, with 157 cities nationwide meeting the air quality standards, said the report submitted to the ongoing regular session of the National People's Congress Standing Committee.

Meanwhile, the impact of the heavily polluted weather mitigated in 2019, with a notable decrease in the peak concentration, pollution intensity, duration and impact scope, compared with previous years, it noted.

According to the report, the share of surface water with a good quality rating at grade III or above was up 3.9 percentage points year on year, while the worst-rated water quality decreased by 3.3 percentage points over the last year.

Improvement was also seen in nationwide rivers and lakes. The proportion of major rivers with a good water quality increased by 4.8 percentage points in 2019.

Among the 110 major lakes and reservoirs monitored across the country, 69.1 percent were rated grade III or above, up 2.4 percentage points year on year while the number of the worst-rated accounted for 7.3 percent, down 0.8 percentage points, it said.

Photo taken on Dec. 27, 2019 shows the scenery of Qutang Gorge, one of the Three Gorges on the Yangtze River, in southwest China's Chongqing Municipality. (Xinhua/Wang Quanchao)

To fight against water pollution, China has adopted a "river or lake chief" system as stipulated in the Water Pollution Prevention and Control Law.

Under the system, stewards are assigned for each waterway to tackle water pollution at the provincial, city, county and village levels. There were over 1.2 million "river or lake chiefs" across the country.

On the whole, the quality of China's offshore waters was improving steadily, the report said, adding that the share of coastal waters with a good water quality totaled 76.6 percent in 2019, an year-on-year increase of 5.3 percentage points.

Regarding lucid waters and lush mountains as invaluable assets, China has made new progress in advancing afforestation in recent years. Its forest coverage rate grew from about 8 percent in the early days of the People's Republic of China to nearly 23 percent in 2019.

In 2019, there were 2,290 counties with good ecological environment, an increase of 729 from the previous year, according to the report.