Bohai Sea showing continued improvement in water quality

The Bohai Sea has seen continuous improvement in its water quality, as the country forges ahead with a special pollution control campaign in the country's largest enclosed sea, an environmental official said.

Following a sharp increase from 2018, the sea's offshore area has seen 77.9 percent of its water be of fairly good quality by the end of 2019. "The improvement has continued so far this year," said Huo Chuanlin, deputy head of marine department at the Ministry of Ecology and Environment, in a news conference on Friday.

Under the country's four-tier quality system for seawater, the quality of seawater is considered fairly good if it reaches Grade II or above.

In the first quarter of this year, the proportion of water with fairly good quality in Bohai's offshore sea area increased to 79.4 percent. Monitoring so far in the third quarter of the year has shown the number has further jumped to 87.1 percent, he continued.

China released an action plan in December 2018 on the comprehensive treatment of pollution in the Bohai Sea, setting the goal for the proportion of fairly good water quality in its offshore waters to be around 73 percent by 2020.

Huo said he is confident the goal will be achieved if no unfavorable meteorological conditions or emergent environmental contamination incidents happen in the last months of the year.