From January to October, the national water environment continued to improve, but the problem of urban and rural non-point source pollution in some areas was outstanding.

From January to October, 2021, among the 3,641 national surface water assessment sections, the proportion of Class I-III sections was 82.6%, an increase of 1.2 percentage points year-on-year; The proportion of inferior V sections was 1.2%, a decrease of 0.8 percentage points year-on-year, and the water ecological environment quality showed a continuous improvement trend. However, the problem of imbalance and disharmony is still outstanding, especially in some areas, such as serious urban and rural non-point source pollution, weak treatment of black and odorous water bodies, and obvious deterioration of water quality in some sections.

There is a certain gap between the proportion of I-III sections in 15 provinces and the annual target, among which the gap in Heilongjiang is more than 5 percentage points, so it is necessary to increase the work. In addition, the proportion of inferior V water bodies in Guizhou and Yunnan is 0.8 and 0.5 percentage points respectively different from the annual target (see Annex 1).

There are 23 sections (excluding those affected by natural factors) that are inferior to Class V, which are distributed in 12 provinces, of which Yunnan has the largest number of 6. The water quality of Gongzhuling section of Xinkai River (Changchun, Jilin) was worse than Grade V for 10 consecutive months.

The water quality of 15 state-controlled sections has obviously deteriorated (excluding sections affected by natural factors), distributed in 9 provinces. Among them, Henan and Shanxi have the most, with three (see Annex 2).

The top 50 national control sections with high pollution intensity in flood season (referring to the ratio of the concentration of primary pollutants in flood season to the target concentration limit of this index) are distributed in 21 provinces, among which Yunnan (9), Shanxi (5) and Jiangxi (5) have more sections (see Annex 3).

In the next step, the Ministry of Ecology and Environment will issue an early warning letter to the relevant provincial ecological and environmental departments, urge the relevant localities to verify the situation, and solidly promote the rectification of the problem. In view of the outstanding problems in some places such as "hiding pollution and accommodating filth" in the dry season and "zero storage and whole withdrawal" in the rainy season, we will guide all localities to strengthen water quality monitoring, analysis and judgment in cross-section flood season, carry out pollution traceability and problem investigation, distinguish the responsibilities of various administrative regions, accurately, scientifically and legally control pollution, and promote the solution of outstanding water environment problems.

　　Appendix 1: Water Quality of Provinces in China from January to October 2021　

　　Attachment 2: List of Sections with Significant Water Quality Deterioration from January to October 2021

　　Attachment 3: List of national control sections with high pollution intensity in flood season from January to October, 2021.