A three-year environmental clean-up scheme has turned the famous Suzhou River in Shanghai from a polluted, stinking river into a clean river with limpid water.

The 125-km-long river, with a 23.8 km-long section traversing the urban area of Shanghai, was once a clean source of drinking water and an ideal site for summer swimming, according to elderly residents.

For more than a century, however, industrial pollutants forced residents living along the river to keep their windows tight shut to keep off nauseating odors. The polluted river impeded to some extent the development and opening-up of Shanghai municipality.

The Shanghai government began addressing the problem in the year 2000. During the first phase of the project, it allocated 30 billion yuan (US$3.6 billion) over the past three years to build 110 key environmental projects in five areas, said Hong Hao, director of the Municipal Environmental Protection Bureau.

Two garbage incineration plants, each with a capacity of handling 1,000 tons per day, were built. And with regard to sewage treatment, there was a 44 percent rise in the amount of garbage treated before discharge.

In the area of urban foliage, trees, bushes and grass were planted on some 3,000 hectares to raise the green coverage rate in urban Shanghai from 19.8 to 30 percent.

Moreover, the second-phase environmental scheme, to be carried out over the next three years, is expected to be launched soon. Its aim is to improve quality of the river water, reduce air pollution, raise the treatment rate of solid residue and further increase the percentage of urban green coverage.

In compliance with an all-round pollution-control program, by 2010, the water quality of the Suzhou river, as well as that of the Huangpu river, will be improved to levels consistent with a healthy habitat for fish.

(Xinhua News Agency February 18, 2003)