By Wan Zhihong (China Daily)
Updated: 2007-10-10 14:23

A total of 256.6 billion yuan was poured into environmental protection in China last year, an increase of 87.7 percent from 2002, according to the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS).

Investment in environmental protection in 2006 accounted for 1.22 percent of the country's gross domestic product (GDP), compared with 1.14 percent in 2002, said the NBS.

China's environmental protection industry has seen rapid growth in the past five years, according to the NBS. In 2006, the total turnover of the sector was 600 billion yuan while profits amounted to 52 billion yuan.

The country has also seen a sound legal system for environmental protection since the 16th National Congress of the Communist Party of China convened in 2002. Over 50 regulations on environmental protection have been put in place since.

Energy saving and environmental protection have become a key policy for the country. The government aims to reduce energy consumption per unit of GDP by 20 percent and major pollutant discharges by 10 percent in the 11th Five-Year Plan period (2006-10).

Take the nation's power industry for example. China will close down all its coal-fired power plants, with a combined capacity of 50,000 mW, by 2010. Desulfurizing facilities with a capacity of 104 million kW were put into operation at the nation's power plants last year.

Now power-generating units with desulfurizing facilities account for around 30 percent of the country's total power plants, compared with 12 percent in 2005.

Along with the nation's ongoing efforts to check pollution, China's forest coverage has risen constantly for almost two decades, increasing the nation's contribution to the world carbon dioxide absorption.

Chinese land vulnerable to desertification is dwindling by about 1,283 sq km per year thanks to years of afforestation, said the NBS.

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The country's forest coverage stands at 174.9 million hectares. Between 2003 and 2006, cultivated forest coverage of the country was 29.01 million hectares.

China has been promoting voluntary tree-planting and afforestation. Earlier estimates said carbon dioxide absorbed by China's forests is over 500 million tons.

By the end of 2005, the urban wastewater treatment capacity was 57.25 million tons a day, a rise of 60 percent from 2002, said the NBS. Chinese cities treated 52 percent of the wastewater they discharged in 2005, a rise of 17 percent, it said.

Among the 559 cities monitored by the State Environmental Protection Administration in 2006, 62.4 percent have enjoyed fine air quality.