Water Quality of Huai River "Clear"

Statistics from the China Environmental Monitoring Center show that the water quality of the Huai River for the year 2000 reached the "clear" standard set by the State Council, according to a top environmental protection officer.

Wang Jirong, a deputy director of State Environmental Protection Administration was quoted in today's People's Daily as saying that by the end of 2000 the Huai River was expected to have hit the "clear" standard, which means that COD (chemical oxygen demand) of the main stream and the branches was controlled at certain levels.

In recent years the government has taken high-efficiency measures to control industrial waste within the drainage area, thus decreasing the pollution caused by organic waste to significant levels and the total amount of COD contained in the water to 0.48 million tons, from the original 1.5 million tons.

Wang also pointed out that controlling COD alone is not enough, as ammonia and nitrogen contained in wastes have severely polluted the water, which is caused by a shortage of waste water processing factories in cities along the river banks.

People's Daily Online --- http://english.peopledaily.com.cn/