On March 4, it was learned from the conference on ecological and environmental conservation and Party-wide self-governance with rigor held by Jingzhou Municipal Ecological Environment Bureau that this year is a year critical to completing ecological goals and tasks of the “14th Five-Year Plan.” The city will build a solid ecological barrier through comprehensive improvement of the river basin, promote green development based on ecological conservation, continue to improve the ecological environment, and ensure a well-protected ecological environment to expedite the building of a demonstration zone for high-quality development in the Jianghan Plain.
The year’s main goals of ecological conservation are to ensure that provincially controlled sections (water areas) of the city’s surface water meets the assessment requirements; the utilization of the city's polluted arable land remains stable at more than 91 %; the proportion of treated rural sewage increases by 3% from the previous year; the annual objective to improve the air quality of Jingzhou is completed.
Jingzhou will continue to carry out ten campaigns for the high-level conservation of the Yangtze River, strengthen control of pollution in phosphate mines, phosphorus manufacturing companies, and phosphogypsum reservoirs, step up supervision over sewage outlets on rivers, accelerate the upgrading of 1,824 sewage outlets on the Yangtze River based on the “one policy for one outlet” principle, and complete upgrading more than 95% of sewage outlets by the end of this year.
Jingzhou will steadily promote the comprehensive improvement of river basins, advance the implementation of the city’s water ecological conservation plan during the “14th Five-Year Plan” period, strengthen the comprehensive improvement of the main canal of the Four Lake Watershed of the Jianghan Plain, and Honghu Lake, among other river basins, advocate the treatment of polluted and stinky waters in rural areas, ensure the safety of drinking water from places at the county level and above that supply water in a centralized way, and advance ecosystem construction for the city's key lakes.
The Jingzhou authorities will also channel ongoing efforts to maintain a blue sky, clear water, and pure land. The concrete measures are to supervise gas-related emissions through law enforcement, avoid heavy pollution, prevent ozone pollution, and improve water quality to ensure that the water quality of the main stream of the Yangtze River remains above Class II, urge all counties (county-level cities) to eliminate 60 percent of urban polluted and stinky water bodies, emphasize the safe use of polluted arable land and key land for construction, investigate hidden risks in key supervisory entities for soil pollution and constantly re-examine these issues, and complete the investigation of solid waste left over from 28 closed mines.
In key industries such as the phosphate fertilizer and the cement industries, Jingzhou authorities will pilot list-based inspection of wastewater discharge permit. By the end of 2023, this policy will be implemented in four industries, including papermaking, steelmaking, waste-based power generation, as well as sewage treatment and recycling.
Besides, Jingzhou will improve the mechanism that guarantees progress in major ecological projects during the “14th Five-Year Plan” period, scheme, implement, and prepare an array of major ecological projects, and implement ten measures to optimize environmental assessment and approval with continued efforts to cater to high-quality economic development.