The biggest environmental protection funding program for civil organizations in China was launched on Wednesday in Beijing.

Fu Wenjuan, chairwoman of the China Environmental Protection Foundation, speaks at a launch ceremony held in Beijing to fund environmental protection NGOs, Jan. 18, 2017. [Photo/ China.org.cn]

Twelve major social organizations and another eight shortlisted NGOs received a total of 5.06 million yuan for support of their projects in the Advance with Future program.

The program, initiated in May 2016, is under the guidance of the Ministry of Environmental Protection. It has financial support from FAW-Volkswagen Automobile Co. Ltd. and is co-sponsored by China Environmental Protection Foundation, China Foundation for Poverty Alleviation and The School of Environment, Tsinghua University.

There are two major projects: one is designed for garbage recycling along the Qinghai-Tibet Railway and the other is for using laws to defend and protect green homelands. Both received 1 million yuan each, the largest funds of all. Other enviromental projects include building ecological monitoring networks for Chinese rivers and preserving the local environment for rare wild animals and plants.

The NGOs have become a third power to help environmental protection causes in China further to government and enterprise efforts. Currently there are more than 3,500 environmental protection organizations in China but most of them suffer from a severe lack of funding support. Some of them have received foreign donations to survive. Now the new domestic program has reached its largest scale in this area to fund China's environmental protection NGOs.

Fu Wenjuan, chairwoman of the China Environmental Protection Foundation, said that the projects managed to receive funding this time as a reflection and representation of the the situation of China's environmental protection social organizations. "They are a major power for the environmental protection job in this country. They work at the low level of society and in harsh environments without much money, but they have love and persistence for environmental protection causes and try very hard to contribute. We should learn from them and salute them. Only when the whole society start to take care and join in the environmental protection efforts, can our homeland become more beautiful."

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