Changsha city has seen a marked improvement in the cleanliness of its lakes and rivers in its Yuhua district under the new nationwide river chief system.

A China.org.cn reporter, along with other press members visited the Guitang River and the Yuyan Lake on Thursday in Changsha, Hunan province, to see how the environment of the Guitang River basin has been restored and improved.

The Guitang River has a total length of 28.3 kilometers, a basin area of 125 square kilometers, a sewage area of about 450 square kilometers, and a population of about 2 million people living in its surrounding neighborhoods. It is the last tributary of the Liuyang River before it enters the Xiang River, and is also the longest inland river in the downtown area of Changsha. 

However, with the acceleration of urbanization, waterfront domestic sewage and industrial wastewater have been directly discharged into the river, resulting in the continuous deterioration of the water quality of the Guitang River.

Chen Huaiyu, deputy head of the Yuhua district government, said that the local government has been actively exploring and innovating on its river management models. This is in accordance with the five major development concepts of "innovation, coordination, being green, openness and sharing," and in accordance with the principle of "overall planning and segmentation implementation." They have been fully promoting the comprehensive management and clean-up of the river basin. 

Pollution prevention and control, dredging, the demolition of illegal buildings, water diversion projects, and ecological landscape belt construction have been implemented in succession. So far, the waste discharge along the Guitang River basin has been completely stopped, the black and foul-smelling bodies of water have been completely eliminated, and the five ecological landscape belts have been completed.

Deng You, chairperson of the board of supervisors of Yuhua State-owned Assets Management Group, told reporters that the Yuhua district government successively invested more than 7 million yuan ($987,000) in 2018 to clean up the river. It installed 6 more automatic water quality testing and monitoring equipment and operation platforms, 1 rainfall monitoring device and 19 sets of equipment to check on the discharge outlet flow. This enables the authorities to comprehensively monitor the water 24 hours a day. The results will help the river chief keep up-to-date on developments on the river and the lake, and will provide the scientific basis for the comprehensive clean-up and improvement of the river basin.

China's central government issued a directive in December 2016 to implement a nationwide river chief system from 2017 onwards. River chiefs, as the name suggests, refer to local officials who are given the additional responsibility of managing and protecting the waterways, as well as preventing pollution and restoring the water ecology.

"Since the full implementation of the river chief system in 2017, the Yuhua district government has been linking top and grassroots departments, actively deploying and coordinating with many departments to further strengthen the implementation of the river chief system, which seeks to clean up our water and the overall district," said Luo Yayun, an official from the comprehensive management headquarters of the Guitang River basin. 

"In the next two years, the experience of the river clean-up and management in Yuhua district will provide lessons and a reference for Changsha city, Hunan province, and even the whole country on how to manage the waterways," Luo added. 

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