Full Text: Progress in China's Human Rights in 2012 (19)

V. Protection of Human Rights in Ecological Progress

There is only one earth for human beings. Promoting ecological progress is of vital importance for humanity's future. Facing increasing resource constraints, severe environmental pollution and ecosystem degradation, China is working to raise the ecological awareness of the need to respect, accommodate and protect nature, give high priority to making ecological progress and incorporate it as one of the five main goals for completing the building a moderately prosperous society in all respects. China is working hard to build a beautiful country and earnestly guaranteeing the citizens' environmental rights and interests.

The legal and policy framework has been established to protect citizens' environmental rights. China has adopted environmental protection as a basic national policy. Thanks to efforts made over the years, China has put in place a rather complete legal framework covering pollution control, resources conservation, and preservation of nature reserves and biodiversity. Since 2010 China has formulated a series of policy documents, including the National Plan on Environmental Protection during the 12th Five-year Plan Period, National Plan for Legislation on Environmental Protection and Formulation of Environmental Economic Policies during the 12th Five-year Plan Period, Plan on Prevention and Control of Atmospheric Pollution in Key Areas during the 12th Five-year Plan Period, Plan on National Soil Environment Protection during the 12th Five-year Plan Period, National Action Plan for Protecting China's Marine Environment from Land-based Pollution, Forestry Development Plan during the 12th Five-year Plan Period, Outline of the National Program on Forest Conservation and Utilization (2010-2020), Outline of the National Afforestation Plan (2011-2020), Comprehensive Plan for the Seven Major River Basins, Implementation Plan of the National Wetland Conservation Project during the 12th Five-year Plan Period, Strategy and Action Plan for Biodiversity Preservation in China (2011-2030), Plan on Energy Conservation and Emission Reduction during the 12th Five-year Plan Period, and Water Function Zoning of the Major Rivers and Lakes of China. Moreover, China has also amended the Law on Water and Soil Conservation and Ambient Air Quality Standard (AAQS), and promulgated administrative regulations such as the Regulations on the Management of Ozone-depleting Substances and Regulations on the Administration of the Taihu Lake Basin. All of the above have improved China's legal system that safeguards Chinese citizens' environmental rights and interests, and helped build an eco-friendly country. The state keeps increasing its investment in environmental protection. During the 11th Five-year Plan period (2006-2010), China's fiscal investment in this sphere was 3.71 times that during the Tenth Five-year Plan period (2001-2005). In 2012 funds from the central and local coffers for environmental protection amounted to 293.2 billion yuan, an increase of 99.8 billion yuan or 51.6 percent over 2009. From 2008 to 2012 the central government earmarked a special fund of 13.5 billion yuan for rural environmental protection, supporting 26,000 villages or towns to carry out comprehensive environmental improvement and eco-friendly demonstration projects, directly benefiting 57 million rural residents. Another special fund, totaling 7.5 billion yuan, was allocated between 2010 and 2012 to support the integrated prevention and control of heavy metal contamination in some key areas. The government appropriately handled a number of emergent environmental hazards that had serious impacts on people's health, and coped with in a positive and effective manner the secondary environmental issues in the aftermath of serious natural disasters, such as the Yushu Earthquake in Qinghai Province and the Zhouqu Mudslides in Gansu Province.

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