The Chinese national capital will endeavor to make all rivers and lakes within the sixth ring road of the city free of pollution by the year 2010.

The goal appears in the Blueprint Regarding Recycling-Based Economic Development of Beijing City for the 11th Five-Year Plan period (2006-2010) published Tuesday.

The city is hoping to meet the goal by regulating the treatment of everyday trash and hazardous waste, and improving the use of recycled water.

The goal is an ambitious one given that national pollution goals were conspicuously not attained in the tenth five-year plan.

According to the document, by the year 2010, more than 50 percent of water used in downtown Beijing will be recycled water, and 99 percent of everyday trash in downtown areas and newly developed residential quarters, as well as all hazardous waste materials, will be properly processed.

A goal has been set of processing 80 percent of trash from the city's rural areas by 2010.

Currently, the city produces and discharges 1.28 billion tons of sewage each year. 55 percent of the five major waterway systems surrounding the city are polluted.

Untreated waste water, industrial effluent and agricultural pollution are blamed for deteriorating water quality in the city's lakes and rivers.

(Xinhua News Agency December 15, 2006)