China plans to invest 2 billion yuan (US$250 million) this year to cut down its pollutant discharge, head of China's environmental watchdog said in Beijing on Thursday.

Zhou Shengxian, director of the State Environmental Protection Administration, said the administration will, by the middle of next year, build a scientific and comprehensive system to scale, monitor and evaluate pollution discharge reduction.

According to Zhou, this year's main efforts will be put on programs that monitor state-controlled key pollutants, enhance environmental law enforcement and information transmission ability.

(Xinhua News Agency March 2, 2007)