Yesterday afternoon, the Jiangsu delegation attending the Fourth Session of the 12th National People’s Congress held an inaugural meeting, and Chen Mengmeng, director of Jiangsu Provincial Environmental Protection Department, took a leave of absence.
At 4: 30 pm, at the end of the group meeting, he dragged his suitcase and appeared next to the elevator of Jingxi Hotel, waiting for the delegates.
He came a little late because of a meeting on a Sino-US atmospheric cooperation project. This project was designated by the Ministry of Environmental Protection to cooperate with the United States in Jiangsu, and this year is the third year of cooperation.
From the United States, China knows that the current ideas and methods of haze control are on the right path. The U.S. representative also told Chen Mengmeng that they had encountered problems in Beijing, so don’t worry.
This is the fourth year that Chen Mengmeng has come to Beijing to attend the National People’s Congress. As an environmental protection director, he pays attention to the air quality during the meeting every year.
In his view, although there is smog in Beijing during the two sessions every year, I can feel that the air is getting better and better and the blue sky is more.
Changzhi Haze of Beijing Environmental Protection Bureau is more experienced than us.
Beiqing Daily: Today is a foggy day. How do you feel about coming to the meeting as the director of the Environmental Protection Department?
Chen Mengmeng: It is the fourth year for me to attend the two sessions. Every time the two sessions are also prone to weather fluctuations in spring, it will not be a good day in the end, and there will be a few very good days, which also shows that there are still real environmental problems in the governance process. However, in the past four years, I feel that Beijing has improved on the whole, with more blue sky.
At the end of last year, because I was studying at the Party School, I happened to catch up with the heavy pollution, which Beijing had not seen in recent years. I can’t understand that it will be so heavy under such a large amount of emission reduction. Later, they explained that it was a meteorological reason, which shows that the long-term and complicated treatment of haze is still there.
As the director of the Environmental Protection Department, I naturally hope that it will be a good day to welcome the two sessions, and it will be a good day during the two sessions, and it will be maintained. In reality, such a day tells us that we still have a long way to go, and we still have to tighten this string. Although we have mastered the basic ideas and methods, governance is still a difficult process, which requires us to have enough patience and perseverance, and we must take resolute actions to accelerate our progress.
Beiqing Daily: Will you be worried about the environmental protection director in Beijing when you see this day?
Chen Mengmeng: I’m not worried. The director of environmental protection in Beijing has more experience in smog control than we do. At that time, Nanjing learned from Beijing to control smog.
Beiqing Daily: Will being the director of the Environmental Protection Department in the Yangtze River Delta be less stressful than the environmental protection chief in Beijing, Tianjin and Hebei?
Chen Mengmeng: It should be said that the environmental protection directors in this era are under great pressure, and each has its own difficulties. Environmental protection is a prominent problem at present, and it will naturally be stressful for the chief official to take responsibility. As for different regions, the Yangtze River Delta has problems with the Yangtze River Delta, and Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei has problems with Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei. I think we are just geographically different, and some of our tasks may be heavier than those of Beijing, Tianjin and Hebei, such as the water problem, and because the industry started earlier, our task of soil control is also heavier.
Beiqing Daily: Some people say that the pollution in the Yangtze River Delta is transmitted by Beijing, Tianjin and Hebei.
Chen Mengmeng: Both transmissions are available. Transmission is inevitable in the air flow, and it has always existed. We have always stressed that in such a large area of the Yangtze River Delta, air control should be based on itself, with external influences accounting for a part, leading or self-control, and we should control our own air well.
The idea of haze control in the "Thirteenth Five-Year Plan" is fine governance.
Beiqing Daily: For heavy pollution emergency, the Ministry of Environmental Protection should push a unified early warning standard. What are the benefits?
Chen Mengmeng: From a local perspective, we call on the state to set a unified standard. The most typical example is the heavy pollution last year. Some places in the Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei region issued red warnings, while others did not, which was uneven. The reason for this is that autonomy is given to the local authorities, and your standards can only be issued at this level, and his standards can only be issued at that level. This is the difference in standards. If there is a unified standard, it is better to take consistent measures.
The common people also keep up with the joneses. His red warning has been issued. His children don’t need to go to school, so how can I do it? Another example is emission reduction. If an enterprise can produce in Tianjin, it cannot produce in Hebei. Therefore, it is best to unify them and all parties can better understand this measure.
Beiqing Daily: In terms of the treatment of haze, the source analysis work was carried out very early, but it seems that the public has not seen its role yet?
Chen Mengmeng: Source analysis is still very useful. It is necessary for accurate governance and clear direction. For active parsing, you need an active list. Source analysis only tells you how much cars contribute and how much coal is contributed, which may help us to understand the general direction and make efforts in a certain area. The source list is targeted, knowing the layout and total amount of various sources.
At present, the air quality assurance during the Youth Olympic Games and the military parade is still a relatively large-scale control. Whoever makes a big contribution will be allowed to reduce emissions, and enterprises such as steel, sintering and coal-fired boilers will be reduced. This is the result of source analysis. If the source list comes out, we can control the point source more pertinently.
Beiqing Daily: Is the source list only being done in Nanjing or all over the country?
Chen Mengmeng: Many cities all over the country are doing it. This is one of the ten requirements of the atmosphere. Future governance, such as the "Thirteenth Five-Year Plan", is more and more refined, more targeted, emergency, battle-like, and universal, which will be used in emergencies, but more often, we are determined to manage in the medium and long term.
Beiqing Daily: Why should we do fine governance?
Chen Mengmeng: Governance has costs, and it cannot be managed on a large scale. Social costs and economic costs should be considered. The so-called refined governance is to achieve the governance cost we want with the least cost and the most controllable cost. Refined governance is targeted governance.
Environmental governance has little impact on the economy.
Beiqing Daily: Recently, there is a view that smog has a great relationship with smuggling. What do you think?
Chen Mengmeng: At present, the crackdown on enterprises’ illegal activities is so great that it should be said that most enterprises dare not steal the arrangement, but a few do? There should be. It exists. If we say that there are cases of smuggling and lax law enforcement, we can’t enlarge them to the macro level, saying that this is the cause of pollution.
I don’t think it is possible that the so-called smuggling causes smog, or that the total amount of emissions does not match our calculation to the degree of subverting the base. Small-scale smuggling will not affect the smog in the country. We now detect that the decline of pm2.5, the improvement of air quality and the total emission reduction are basically the same, which is a positive effect.
Beiqing Daily: Last year, great efforts were made to control the environment, but there was also a voice that pollution control affected the economy, such as pollution control in Linyi.
Chen Mengmeng: Pollution control in Linyi is based on the environmental protection law. Later, the media also proved that pollution control is still good for promoting transformation and upgrading. In my opinion, enterprises that evade environmental protection costs will not have long-term vitality in the market. We want environmental protection and economy to complement each other, that is, we must grasp a rhythm, and enterprises that violate environmental protection laws must not be allowed to survive. Enterprises that affect people’s health and people’s livelihood must not be allowed to survive because of a few simple data. We have always said that environmental protection has forced transformation. Without environmental protection, there may be no transformation. After being forced, there will be better development at a new starting point.
Beiqing Daily: But in the economic downturn, how to spend such a painful period?
Chen Mengmeng: The economy is always fluctuating. Now the fundamentals of the economy are good. The so-called downward pressure on the economy is relatively large, which does not mean that we will cancel the environmental governance plan. Our governance is refined, and we rarely do things across the board, which should have a little impact on economic activities, but it is not very big. In this case, we must consider the bearing capacity of local areas, and the projects in the governance plan should be unswervingly promoted, which will give birth to a number of new industries, such as environmental protection industries, which in turn will support economic development and create new demands.
When the responsibility is unclear, the environmental protection department will be wronged
Beiqing Daily: In the past year, did you feel that environmentalists were a little harder?
Chen Mengmeng: Not only in the past year, but especially in recent years, the CPC Central Committee has attached so much importance to ecological civilization and given more and more understanding and support to all aspects of environmental protection work. If you talk about car-scrapping, we are confident, with more and more means of environmental protection and stronger self-confidence, which is for sure.
Beiqing Daily: However, Chen Jining, Minister of Environmental Protection, said a few days ago that there are still frequent local government interventions in environmental law enforcement. Have you met it?
Chen Mengmeng: It may happen all over the country, but this situation is getting less and less in Jiangsu. It should be said that local governments dare to blatantly intervene in environmental law enforcement and intervene in the pre-control of environmental protection with projects as the mainstay. At least, they dare not make it public.
Beiqing Daily: Last year, many people were held accountable in the field of environmental protection. Some provincial environmental protection department directors believe that some of them are not problems of environmental protection system, but the boards are all on environmental protection officials.
Chen Mengmeng: Many things that ordinary people don’t understand are considered environmental protection. Environmental protection is to monitor, supervise and supervise illegal activities. The environmental problems caused in front are not managed by environmental protection, and there may be cases where management is not in place. However, pollution is produced by various lines and must be treated together.
When pursuing the responsibility, the environmental protection department, as a department with supervision function, will definitely suffer some grievances when the responsibilities of various departments are unclear. Now the Jiangsu Provincial Party Committee and the provincial government are very clear, and the responsibilities of local governments, various departments and environmental protection departments are clearly divided. Our recent detailed rules on the accountability of party and government cadres for environmental protection have further clarified the accountability methods for various environmental protection responsibilities.
Beiqing Daily: Can this prevent environmental protection officials from being held accountable for environmental problems in the future?
Chen Mengmeng: In the past, environmental officials were not always held accountable. Apart from environmental protection, jobs in other industries will have similar difficulties. However, whenever accountability, such as safety in production, is pursued, the competent authorities will have such difficulties. In the past, it was true that the environmental protection responsibilities were unclear. Many things were assigned by the organization and we did it. We didn’t distinguish the responsibilities in advance. Once something happened, we would be held accountable. Who did it? I don’t know.
Environmental protection department cannot be regarded as Qingshui yamen.
Beiqing Daily: Last year, many environmental protection officials were dismissed, but in many people’s impressions, the environmental protection department is a clear water gate. Why are so many officials corrupt?
Chen Mengmeng: Environmental protection can’t be regarded as a clear water yamen. I have been in the environmental protection industry for many years. As soon as I came, I found that over the years, laws and governments have given environmental protection more and more power. It has the power of law enforcement, law enforcement and supervision, as well as the right to allocate funds and approve projects. Other departments rarely concentrate so much power on one department. For example, the National Development and Reform Commission can approve projects, but rarely go to enterprises for law enforcement.
In addition, for some small areas, such as hazardous waste supervision, the law gives the environmental protection department very detailed powers. If an enterprise makes a slight move, it must be approved and recognized, because there must always be a public institution to recognize it. Once the supervision is not good, corruption is likely to occur, and there are also such cases in the grassroots environmental protection system in our province. In recent years, our industry has been grasping all lines, and thanks to the country’s big anti-corruption situation, this situation has gradually improved.
Wenhe photo/reporter Zou Chunxia
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