Vice-Mayor Liu Jingmin told a press conference Friday that the days with air quality of level II or better accounted for 55.1 percent of the whole year. The city had fulfilled the goal set at the beginning of this year to clean the air.

China classifies air quality in urban areas in five levels: level I or excellent (pollution reading: not exceeding 50), level II or fairly good (pollution reading: 51 to 100), level III or slightly polluted (pollution reading: 101 to 200), level IV or poor (pollution reading: 201 to 300), and level V or hazardous (pollution reading: over 301).

The city cut the use of coal by 1 million tons this year and had 1,681 sets of coal-fueled boilers use cleaner energy, said ShiHanmin, director of the city administration of environmental protection.

More than 180,000 cars in the city had met the Euro I emission standard before the even stricter Euro II emission standard was adopted on Aug. 1, he added.

The city government has continued to move factories causing airpollution away from the downtown area or have them shut down. The Capital Iron and Steel Company, the major source of industrial pollution, has been reducing production, by 2 million tons this year.

The municipal government has vowed to continue improving air quality and relieve pollution in a bid to give the city clean air for 60 percent of the whole year.

(Xinhua News Agency December 28, 2002)