China aims to balance high-quality development with strong environmental protection

BEIJING, July 16 (Xinhua) -- China seeks to balance high-quality development with high-level environmental protection over the next five years as it advances the building of a Beautiful China, a senior official said on Thursday.

Minister of Ecology and Environment Huang Runqiu made the remarks after the country recently issued a plan for building a Beautiful China during the 15th Five-Year Plan period (2026-2030), which calls for a comprehensive improvement in the quality of the ecological environment by 2030.

China will implement determined measures to address prominent environmental problems, Huang said.

The campaign to improve air quality will remain a top priority in the country's pollution-control efforts, with a continued decline in PM2.5 concentrations as the main focus, he noted.

China will also work to promote the green and low-carbon transformation of industrial, energy and transport structures, and foster new quality productive forces to reduce pollutant emissions at the source, Huang said.

The 15th Five-Year Plan period will be crucial for China to achieve its carbon emissions peak, Huang stated. The country will explore carbon-footprint management for a broad range of products, from automotive power batteries to everyday items such as drinking cups.

China will control both the amount and intensity of carbon emissions, accelerate the development of a national carbon market, and deepen energy-saving and carbon-reduction upgrades, Huang revealed, stressing that carbon peaking efforts will be carried out in a planned and phased manner.

Over the past decade and more, China has made solid progress in ecological conservation. It has become the country with the world's fastest improvement in air quality, while also recording the largest and fastest growth in forest resources and the world's largest area of planted forests.

China has, additionally, become the first country in the world to achieve a simultaneous reduction in the areas of both desertified and sandy land.