A proposed draft amendment to the Environmental Protection Law would make it easier for agencies to file public interest lawsuits against polluters.

An elderly man exercises on the side of Songhua River in the heavily polluted city of Jilin, Jilin province, on Feb 24.

Environment agencies that have registered with the Ministry of Civil Affairs for five years running and are deemed to have a good reputation will be able to file lawsuits against polluters.

The amendment, if it is approved, would be a major change to the law. Previously, only the All-China Environmental Federation was allowed to file public interest lawsuits. According to the National People's Congress Standing Committee, 13 agencies are thus far qualified to file a lawsuit if the amendment became law.

The amendment could be addressing concerns that the federation may not be capable of filing lawsuits across the country because of its limited human and financial resources.

Zhou Ke, an environmental protection law professor at Renmin University of China, said there is a lot of controversy surrounding the new drafts to the environment law, the third thus far — a fourth draft is expected sometime this week. But among the draft amendments, this stipulation that determines who is qualified to file a lawsuit against polluters is the most contentious.

The federation is a State-supported nonprofit organization considered by many legal experts the most capable environment agency, if not the only one, to file public interest lawsuits.

The second draft amendment to the Environmental Protection Law proposed that the All-China Environmental Federation and other local environment federations are qualified to file lawsuits, but many legal experts have interpreted the second draft to mean that only the All-China Environmental Federation has been sanctioned.

Although the third draft amendment on Monday has expanded the number of accepted environment agencies, experts said it will still be difficult for those agencies to meet the amendment’s requirements.