The central government¡¯s affirmation, local support, people¡¯s praise, and remarkable results

The central environmental protection inspection is very powerful: from 2016 to 2017, it completed the inspection of China¡¯s Full coverage of 31 provinces

The intensity of pollution control is unprecedented, and the speed of environmental quality improvement is unprecedented

Reporter from "China Economic Weekly" Zhang Lujing, Li Yonghua, and Liu Zhaopu | Reporting from Beijing, Jiangxi, Hunan, Jiangsu, and Guizhou

(This article was published in the 43rd issue of "China Economic Weekly" in 2017)

"Building ecological civilization is China's A millennium plan for the sustainable development of the nation¡±

¡°Accelerate the reform of the ecological civilization system and build a beautiful China¡±

From the report of the 19th National Congress of the Communist Party of China. A series of important conclusions are enough to show the importance of ecological civilization construction.

"Pollution prevention and control" is also listed as the "three major battles" in building a moderately prosperous society in an all-round way, along with preventing and resolving major risks and targeted poverty alleviation.

As Minister of Environmental Protection Li Ganjie said, the report of the 19th National Congress of the Communist Party of China put forward a series of new ideas, new requirements, new goals and new arrangements for the construction of ecological civilization and ecological environmental protection.

In the five years since the 18th National Congress of the Communist Party of China, the construction of ecological civilization has achieved remarkable results, which can be seen from a set of data: In the past five years, China¡¯s forest coverage rate has continued to increase. 21.38% increased to 22.3% in 2016; the average concentration of PM2.5 in Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei, the Yangtze River Delta, and the Pearl River Delta in 2016 dropped by more than 30% compared with 2013; since the implementation of the "Ten Water Measures", surface water levels I to III The proportion of sections meeting Class V increased from 6% to 67.8%, and the proportion of sections inferior to Class V dropped from 9.7% to 8.6%...

Li Ganjie used five "unprecedented" words to describe China's development in the five years since the 18th National Congress of the Communist Party of China. Achievements in the field of ecological environmental protection and ecological civilization construction: the depth of ideological understanding is unprecedented, the intensity of pollution control is unprecedented, the frequency of systems is unprecedented, the scale of supervision and law enforcement is unprecedentedly strict, and the speed of environmental quality improvement is unprecedented.

Behind the continuous improvement of many environmental data, in the past five years, a major reform measure of the ecological civilization system and mechanism - the Central Environmental Protection Inspectorate has undoubtedly played a huge role.

Since the Central Environmental Protection Inspectorate launched a pilot project in Hebei Province in January 2016, in the two years from 2016 to 2017, the Central Environmental Protection Inspectorate has completed full coverage of 31 provinces in China, with more than 17,000 people held accountable. . Regarding the effectiveness of the central environmental protection inspection, Li Ganjie summarized it as "the people praise it, the central government affirms it, the local government supports it, and it solves the problem."

Why does the Central Environmental Protection Inspectorate show such power? What is the rectification status of the inspected areas after the inspection team left? Is there a situation where "when the inspection team leaves, the pollution comes back"? How can local governments and enterprises achieve a win-win situation between environmental protection and development? "China Economic Weekly" reporters will take you to various places to have a look.

Why is the central environmental protection inspection so powerful?

From environmental supervision to environmental supervision, from ¡°supervision of enterprises¡± to ¡°supervision of government¡±

The Central Environmental Protection Supervision was held in January 2016 Hebei launched a pilot project, and by August 2017, the fourth batch of central environmental protection inspectors had been stationed in eight provinces including Sichuan and Jilin. So far, in two years from 2016 to 2017, the central environmental protection inspection has completed coverage of all provinces in China.

On July 1, 2015, the 14th meeting of the Central Leading Group for Comprehensively Deepening Reforms reviewed and approved the "Environmental Protection Inspection Plan (Trial)" (hereinafter referred to as the "Inspection Plan"), highlighting environmental issues and Places with frequent major environmental incidents and poor implementation of environmental protection responsibilities will be targeted for early inspection, focusing on the implementation of the Party Central Committee's decisions and arrangements, the resolution of outstanding environmental problems, and the implementation of the main responsibilities of environmental protection.

The outside world believes that this meeting laid the institutional basis for the environmental protection inspection system and designed the basic framework.

In fact, environmental protection supervision is the norm in environmental protection work, but the launch of central environmental protection supervision has put many provinces under pressure. Traditional environmental protection supervision, even if it is a cross-regional supervision, only targets enterprises. Although it can detect pollution problems, it spends a lot of energy on point source supervision to solve local problems, and often "the pollution comes again after the supervision is gone" ".

¡°If a problem is reported multiple times, although it is handled at different levels, it will eventually be transferred back to the local government. The local ¡°local policy¡±, the leader¡¯s arbitrary decision-making, and human relations will directly affect the solution of the problem. , so a problem is still a problem after several years,¡± an environmental protection industry insider told reporters.

The central environmental protection inspection has changed from being led by the environmental protection department to being led by the central government, and from focusing on inspecting enterprises to "both inspection and supervision, with supervision as the main focus", which is regarded as a major change in China's environmental supervision model .

The "Inspection Plan" requires that inspection work be carried out in the form of a central environmental protection inspection team for provincial, district and municipal party committees and governments and their relevant departments, and to some prefecture-level and municipal party committees and government departments. Environmental protection inspection emphasizes "the party and government have equal responsibilities" and "one post has two responsibilities", which means that the local party committee and the government accept supervision together, and the inspection results serve as an important basis for the assessment, evaluation, appointment and removal of leading cadres.

According to the requirements, the inspection team will be stationed for about one month. During the inspection period, each inspection team will set up special duty telephone numbers and postal mailboxes to accept letters and calls from environmental protection departments in the inspected provinces. Other letters and calls that do not fall within the scope of acceptance will be handed over to the inspected regions, units and relevant departments for handling according to regulations. . A mobilization meeting should be held before the inspection begins, and a feedback meeting should be held after the inspection. The rectification plans of each province, region, and city must be reported to the State Council within 30 days, and the rectification status must be reported within 6 months, and shall be made public to the outside world at the same time.

Generally speaking, the inspections are divided into three stages: provincial-level inspections, inspections in lower-level cities, and sorting, analysis and archiving. Each of the three stages has its own focus and is advanced in sequence.

The first stage is provincial-level inspection. The inspection team has a clear division of labor. Some of them inspect a number of provincial leaders, including the provincial party committee secretary and provincial governor, as well as the economic, information, development and reform, housing and construction, etc. The main leaders of provincial departments closely related to environmental protection spoke individually; others read materials, visited for consultation, held meetings to study and focus on issues.

The second stage is sinking inspection, which aims to conduct in-depth investigations and verify and collect evidence on problems that have been grasped at the provincial level. Generally no new problems are discovered. Some specific issues may also require special additional inspections.

The third stage is the stage of sorting out and summarizing the report. It combines provincial-level inspections, lower-level inspections and accepted reporting clues and writes an inspection report. Every question and clue in the report is supported by dozens of materials including inquiry transcripts.

Take Hebei, the province where environmental protection inspections first entered, as an example. Gao Jianmin, Party Secretary and Director of the Hebei Provincial Environmental Protection Department, said that Hebei Province was the first in China to establish an environmental protection inspection system, which was established by the Provincial Party Committee and Provincial Government. The inspection team began to inspect 13 cities in Hebei Province from June 2016 to June 2017, achieving full coverage of environmental protection inspections in the entire province. At the same time, the Hebei Public Security Department also established an environmental police team relatively early, specializing in cutting pollution and cracking down on illegal criminals.

¡°At present, it should be said that the original reform goals have been achieved, and from the actual operation point of view, it has exerted the greatest effect in implementing the strictest ecological and environmental protection system and strict environmental supervision.¡± Gao Jianmin explain.

The central environmental protection inspection has achieved remarkable results: it accepted 135,000 cases and the settlement rate exceeded 98%

How powerful is the central environmental inspection? In the two years from 2016 to 2017, the Central Environmental Protection Inspection Team has completed coverage of 31 provinces in China and has held more than 17,000 people accountable.

Take the fourth batch of central environmental protection inspectors as an example. On September 5, 2017, the Ministry of Environmental Protection revealed that the sinking stage of the fourth batch of central environmental protection inspectors has ended, and all localities have further strengthened the work of supervision and reform at the same time. As of September 4, the fourth batch of environmental protection inspectors had opened 226 cases for investigation, detained 285 people, interviewed 2,914 people, and held 4,129 people accountable.

According to the National Environmental Protection Inspectorate Office, as of September 4, the eight inspection teams had received a total of 44,134 reports from the public and accepted 32,277 valid reports. After sorting out and merging repeated reports, a total of 44,134 reports had been received by the eight inspection teams. 29,189 cases were transferred; 18,565 cases were investigated and dealt with in each inspected locality, of which 5,625 companies were filed and punished with a penalty amount of 280.8783 million yuan.

How to evaluate the effectiveness of environmental inspections? Will the pollution come back as soon as the inspection team leaves, or will many companies have the problem of "when you come, I stop, when you leave, I continue production"? How to form a long-term and effective deterrent in the supervision mechanism? What specific deployments will there be in the future?

In response to these issues, Minister of Environmental Protection Li Ganjie said that the central environmental protection inspection is a major reform measure of the ecological civilization system and mechanism personally advocated and promoted by General Secretary Xi Jinping after the 18th National Congress. "The two-year central environmental protection inspection should be said to be very effective. Someone summed it up and asked the people to praise it, the central government to affirm it, the local government to support it, and to solve the problem."

Specifically, Li Ganjie said, Environmental protection inspectors first greatly increased the awareness of strengthening ecological and environmental protection and promoting green development in all aspects. The situation of neglecting ecological and environmental protection in the past has changed significantly. Secondly, it has effectively solved the outstanding environmental problems around a large number of people.

According to statistics, during the four batches of central environmental protection inspections, a total of 135,000 reports from the masses were accepted. After excluding some duplicate cases, after merging, 104,000 cases were handed over to local governments. So far, 102,000 cases have been handed over to local governments. The case was completed. Approximately 80,000 of these cases involve issues such as garbage, oil fume, stench, noise, corporate pollution, and black and smelly water bodies.

Environmental protection inspections also promote the transformation and upgrading of local industrial structures. Li Ganjie said that many places regard the central environmental protection inspection as a good opportunity and motivation to promote green development and advance supply-side structural reform. They take this opportunity to strengthen enterprises' pollution prevention and control, internalize environmental costs, and allow law-abiding enterprises to have a fairer competition. The environment, especially the rectification of scattered, chaotic and polluting enterprises, has relatively well solved the problem of "bad money driving out good money" that is prominent in some places.

¡°The central environmental protection inspection has also effectively promoted the improvement and improvement of local environmental protection and ecological civilization mechanisms. Many places regard the central environmental protection inspection as a good opportunity to carefully sort out and analyze problems and speed up the establishment and improvement of relevant laws and regulations. There are roughly three to four hundred systems,¡± Li Ganjie said.

In response to the question of whether "the inspectors have left and the pollution has returned" in the future, Li Ganjie said that at the end of this year or early next year, "mobile and acupuncture" will be organized to target key areas, key industries, and key issues. Special inspection.

At the same time, the Ministry of Environmental Protection is also making a full summary of the first four batches of environmental protection inspections. "Study and promote the formulation of relevant regulations on central environmental protection inspection. Put the effective mechanism of this work into the track of legalization and standardization, so that it can develop and persist in the long term." Li Ganjie said.

Closely tracking economic data during the central environmental protection inspection process

How can clear waters and lush mountains turn into gold and silver? Will environmental protection affect GDP development? Are there conflicts between the two goals of economic development and environmental protection?

Zhang Yong, deputy director of the National Development and Reform Commission, said that pollution control will require some highly polluting companies to implement certain control measures, which will affect certain benefits as far as the companies themselves are concerned. However, for the overall situation, it is necessary to better accelerate the construction of ecological civilization.

¡°In the long run, from a macro perspective, and from an overall perspective, environmental protection has no impact on economic development. Strengthening environmental protection, promoting green development, and strengthening ecological civilization construction are positively related to economic development. ." Li Ganjie said.

On October 19, the National Economic Performance Report Card released by the National Bureau of Statistics showed that China¡¯s GDP growth rate in the first three quarters of 2017 was 6.9%, the same as the first half of the year, and 0.2 faster than the same period in 2016. percentage points.

¡°Since the 18th National Congress of the Communist Party of China, especially in the past two years, whether it is the central environmental protection inspection we have carried out or the special environmental law enforcement actions currently being carried out in some key areas, environmental protection has not Affecting economic development." Li Ganjie said, "During the central environmental protection inspection process, we also closely tracked the economic data of these regions and found that the economic indicators have not been affected in any way, and in a sense they are better than before."

Li Ganjie said that in the process of promoting and strengthening environmental protection, it is necessary to fight both a tough battle and a protracted battle. The accumulation of problems does not occur in a day or two, and it will not be solved overnight. Therefore, in the specific implementation process, on the one hand, there will be zero tolerance for some enterprises that violate laws and regulations and pollute the environment, and they will be dealt with seriously in accordance with laws and regulations; but on the other hand, we must also follow the principle of classified guidance, one factory, one policy, specific problems Conduct specific analysis to avoid ¡°one size fits all¡±.

Leping, Jiangxi: Can the cycle of pollution control in the chemical city be broken?

¡°Since the central environmental protection inspection last year, the strange smell here has indeed reduced, and the water in Le¡¯an River has become clearer.¡± A villager near Tashan Industrial Park, Leping City, Jingdezhen City, Jiangxi Province He told a reporter from China Economic Weekly, "But I'm afraid that after the inspection is completed, the pollution here may still be the same."

Tashan Industrial Park is the industrial backbone of Leping City, where major local chemical companies are concentrated. Since it was put into operation, its increasing pollution problems have caused increasingly fierce conflicts between the pollution-discharging enterprises and surrounding villagers, triggering rounds of protests. Local governments are often pressured to launch whirlwind pollution control campaigns and shut down polluting companies, only for pollution to return again and again after the storm passes.

Leping City has fallen into the cycle of "pollution-protest-pollution control-rebound" and has become the "severely affected area" of environmental pollution in Jiangxi.

From July 14 to August 14, 2016, the Fourth Environmental Protection Inspection Team of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China conducted an environmental protection inspection in Jiangxi Province. In its feedback to the Jiangxi Provincial Party Committee and the Provincial Government on November 17 of that year, the inspection team pointed out that "Jingdezhen Leping Industrial Park is seriously polluted" and mentioned that enterprises in the park have long used rainwater ditches to secretly discharge wastewater, and the government has issued "land regulations" that hinder environmental law enforcement. "policies" and the use of fiscal funds to pay sewage charges on behalf of enterprises.

Under the high-pressure line of the central environmental protection inspection, can Leping City¡¯s pollution control get out of the previous vicious cycle?

When the south wind blows, half of the people in Leping City will be "stunned awake"

On October 22, 2001, Tashan Industrial Park officially Ground-breaking construction, as the second industrial park in Leping City, has a total planned area of 10 square kilometers and a built-up area of 6.3 square kilometers. It is about 9 kilometers away from Leping urban area.

The reporter saw this introduction on the park's publicity board, "The park has 60 fine chemical and biopharmaceutical companies, of which 50 are involved in chlor-alkali basic chemicals and derivative products. Chemical products have reached Ten major categories and more than 200 species. Tianxin Pharmaceutical's vitamin B6 and B1 production account for 70% and 40% of the global share. Shilong Industrial is China's largest manufacturer of AC foaming agents and sulfoxide chloride. Jinlong Chemical's grass Glyphosate products are dominant in China, and Hongbai Chemical¡¯s silane coupling agent products are dominant in the world.¡±

An official in Leping City told reporters that the manufacturers and related companies of these products are pollutants. When large companies produce vitamins B6 and B1, for example, the strong smell of rotten eggs was once a nightmare for surrounding residents.

A villager in Shenjialing Village, Tashan Industrial Park, said, ¡°Many of our windows here are sealed and we never dare to open them. These companies often discharge their gases secretly at night, and the smell is too strong, which makes people feel uncomfortable. Can¡¯t sleep¡±. A citizen in Leping City said, "Sometimes when the south wind blows, the smell of rotten eggs wafts from Tashan, and half of the city wakes up from the smell."

"Park companies have long-term use "The secret discharge of wastewater from rainwater ditches" is an issue criticized by the Central Environmental Protection Inspection Team. On September 13, 2017, at the Dashan Temple sewage outlet in Tashan Subdistrict, a reporter from China Economic Weekly saw that only a small stream of wastewater was discharged to the Le'an River, and the water was crystal clear. A villager who was hoeing said, "This kind of water has been treated by sewage. There is no sewage these days because someone from above comes to inspect."

After the Central Environmental Protection Inspection Team came< /strong>

In November 2016, after the Central Environmental Protection Inspection Team named and criticized many times in its feedback, Leping City has become a key rectification target of Jiangxi Environmental Protection Inspectorate, and rounds of overt and covert inspections followed. Come.

The Leping Municipal Government has also taken many rectification measures. ¡¶ A report on the environmental remediation of Tashan Industrial Park obtained by a reporter from China Economic Weekly stated that "with the development of the chemical park, the contradiction between the park's environmental problems and the people's demands has become increasingly prominent. In order to improve the environmental quality of the park, in recent years, the Leping Municipal Party Committee and Municipal Government have vigorously promoted the park's environmental remediation actions and actively explored remediation methods. The wastewater and waste gas treatment in the park has achieved significant results, and the park's environment has been significantly improved." In the remediation work, the problem of illegal discharge of wastewater pointed out by the Central Environmental Protection Inspection Team is the focus of remediation. Peng Jianfei, head of the Leping Municipal Environmental Protection Working Group, introduced that the park's rainwater pipe network renovation project was launched at the end of 2016, and the closed deep-buried trench pipes that were originally not conducive to the supervision of the environmental protection department were gradually transformed into surface open rainwater pipe networks in sections and batches, "from underground to surface". At present, except for individual sections, most of them have been completed and put into use, and the old rainwater pipe network is being fully blocked.

"From May 1 this year, we commissioned a third-party agency to install a rainwater monitoring system." Peng Jianfei said that all enterprises in the park must install online monitoring equipment for rainwater outlets to ensure 24-hour monitoring of the water quality (pH value, COD, total phosphorus, ammonia nitrogen, etc.) at the enterprise's rainwater outlets. At the same time, strengthen the supervision of the park's sewage and power pipe network to ensure that all sewage meets the pipe standard and enters the power pipe network.

In addition to the illegal discharge of wastewater, foul-smelling gas is another problem that local residents complain about the most and most strongly. Peng Jianfei said that there is no specific national standard to define the emission of malodorous gases. "Sometimes smelling a strange smell does not mean that the pollution is serious."

The person in charge of environmental protection of Tianxin Pharmaceutical, a company in the park, said that the raw materials for producing vitamins do have a certain smell, and the poor sealing of vehicles during transportation will also leak the smell. "These are difficult to avoid completely, but this does not mean air pollution. We have made a lot of environmental protection investment to improve the situation in this regard."

On September 13, 2017, in the Tianxin Pharmaceutical Park, reporters could smell a relatively slight smell, but it was not strong. Many villagers in Tashan Park said that because most of the companies have closed down for half a year, the smell is indeed relatively light.

The "Report on the Environmental Remediation of Tashan Industrial Park" shows that according to preliminary statistics, since 2015, the park enterprises have invested a total of about 144.25 million yuan in environmental protection transformation funds, and in 2016, they have successively invested 105.38 million yuan in environmental protection transformation. In 2017, on the basis of the previous foundation, further promotion of enterprise upgrading and transformation was made, and the level of "three wastes" treatment of various enterprises has reached a new level.

The close distance between residential houses and factory areas is considered one of the direct factors for frequent environmental conflicts. While rectifying the environment, Leping City has also launched a large-scale demolition operation. A reporter from China Economic Weekly saw that a number of residential houses and corporate dormitories had been reduced to rubble around the Tashan Park. Peng Jianfei said that it is planned to demolish more than 2,000 houses.

Choose environment or GDP? To have both, the government faces a big test

In this environmental inspection storm, as local star companies, Tianxin Pharmaceuticals, Jinlong Chemicals, etc. were not greatly affected and were all in operation, while the production of most small and medium-sized enterprises in the park was paused.

Peng Jianfei introduced that at present, most enterprises are in the stage of suspension and rectification. If the enterprises believe that the environmental protection measures meet the standards after self-inspection, they will apply to the government for resumption of work, and they can resume production only after being evaluated by a third-party assessment agency. "From May to now, no enterprise has passed the review."

Leping City stated in the "Report on the Environmental Remediation of Tashan Industrial Park" that "the resumption of production of enterprises that have stopped production in the park will be strictly inspected and accepted, and enterprises whose wastewater treatment facilities cannot meet the standards for wastewater treatment will not be allowed to resume production."

This practice has been "complained" by many enterprises in the park. A company leader said, "Our production is also legal and compliant. Now we have stopped production for rectification. I don't know when we can resume production. The loss is too great."

When rectifying, stopping production is indeed the fastest way to control pollution. On November 20, 2016, CCTV reported that an industrial park in Jiujiang, Jiangxi Province, stopped all enterprises to deal with environmental protection inspections. "Overnight, the Jishan Chemical Park was clear." Unfortunately, as soon as the inspection team left, pollution revived.

Such a response highlights the dilemma of the local government between the environment and GDP. The chemical industry is a highly polluting industry, but it is also the economic pillar of Leping. Long-term and large-scale suspension of production for rectification is not a good idea.

In 2015, residents in Leping protested against pollution. In August of that year, the official website of the Leping Municipal Government stated, "For the sake of clean air, environmental protection governance will not be stopped until it is effective." It then published a "Letter to Citizens", saying, "For enterprises that have stopped production for rectification, those that fail to meet safety assessment, environmental assessment or "three wastes" emission standards shall not resume production."

However, in 2015, as the central environmental protection inspection team pointed out, Leping, which is highly dependent on the chemical industry, also issued "local policies" to obstruct environmental law enforcement. From 2012 to 2014, the Leping Municipal Government even violated the "Regulations on the Collection and Use of Pollution Fees" and paid 11.47 million yuan in pollution fees for 36 polluting enterprises out of its own pocket.

Such contradictory practices have caused great damage to the credibility of the local government. After the central environmental protection inspection, although the local environment has indeed improved significantly, many people interviewed by the reporter of "China Economic Weekly" still have doubts about the government's subsequent rectification efforts and effectiveness.

At the same time, China Economic Weekly reporters learned from multiple sources during local investigations that Tashan Industrial Park still had intermittent illegal discharges more than a year after the central environmental protection inspection. "Just recently, the water discharged here in the middle of the night was still very large, scarlet, and smelled strong." A resident near the Dashan Temple sewage outlet said.

As of September 13, among the 60 enterprises in Tashan Park, only large enterprises such as Tianxin Pharmaceutical, Shilong Industrial, Jinlong Chemical, and Hongbo Chemical were operating as usual, and the future of more than 50 other enterprises was still unknown.

Leping City stated in the "Report on the Environmental Remediation of Tashan Industrial Park" that it encourages enterprises to merge and reorganize, and enterprises that are not sure will withdraw from the park on their own. Peng Jianfei emphasized that "chemical parks only do subtraction, not addition, and small and micro enterprises should be closed down when they should be closed down, and the environment should not be damaged for a little bit of GDP."

On July 10 this year, Jingdezhen Mayor Mei Yi was interviewed by the Ministry of Environmental Protection. According to media reports, Mei Yi said, "As the mayo

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