Living water from Taihu water system was purified and was removed from 8 high-speed production lines of China Resources Yibao Beverage (Yixing) Co., Ltd. at a rate of 81,000 bottles per hour and sold to the whole country.
From the outbreak of cyanobacteria and water environment pollution in that year, to the settlement of well-known water companies today. A bottle of water reflects the ecological changes of Taihu Lake.
"Is Taihu Lake a little better?" "No cyanobacteria?" During the 2023 National People's Congress and the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference, General Secretary Xi Jinping emphasized when participating in the deliberation of the Jiangsu delegation: "We must grasp the ecology."
Taihu Lake is beautiful, and beauty lies in the water of Taihu Lake. To thoroughly implement the spirit of General Secretary Xi Jinping’s important speech, Jiangsu shoulders the responsibility of upstream and delivers a new answer to Taihu Lake governance: In 2024, the total phosphorus concentration in Taihu Lake will drop to 0.05 mg/liter. "This marks the first time that Taihu Lake has achieved Class III water quality throughout the year since this century and returns to a 'good' lake." said Jiang Wei, director of the Jiangsu Provincial Department of Ecology and Environment.
In February 2023, Yibao Company settled in Zhoutie Town, Yixing City, and expanded its production in the second phase in June 2024, with an annual production capacity of 200 million boxes. The reassurance that the company has taken comes from the promise of Zhoutie Town's "no transformation zone".
The entire area is located in Zhoutie Town, which has 25 rivers entering the lake. It has successively closed and transferred 151 chemical companies, and has successively stopped high-pollution enterprises. The former "hometown of chemicals" has turned into a "no chemical area".
Empty the cage and replace the birds to cultivate new quality productivity. Relying on the traditional advantages of manufacturing and the surrounding supporting industrial chain, Zhoutie Town has re-planned four major successor industries such as life and health, high-end equipment, new energy vehicle accessories, and environmental protection, and introduced cultural and tourism projects such as "Da Nihua Bay". In 2024, the total output value of Zhoutie Town's industrial and cultural tourism industries exceeded 25 billion yuan.
Zhoutie Town is a microcosm of the coordination between Jiangsu's high-quality development and high-level protection of Taihu Lake. Taihu Lake is a large shallow lake with dense population, dense urban and industrial areas in the Taihu Lake basin. The Taihu Lake area in Jiangsu accounts for 20% of the province's land area, carrying more than 30% of the population and more than 40% of the total economic output. In recent years, Suzhou, Wuxi and Changzhou have promoted the development of strategic emerging industries and high-tech industries. 166 national green factories, 498 provincial green factories, and 16 green industrial parks have been connected to each other along the Taihu Lake coast.
"Taihu Lake governance is a landmark project for Jiangsu's ecological civilization construction and an answer to Jiangsu's high-quality development." Jiangsu Provincial Party Secretary Xin Changxing said, "On the new journey, Jiangsu will deeply implement Xi Jinping's ecological civilization thought and strive to fully demonstrate the realistic picture of harmonious coexistence between man and nature, and the green waters and green mountains and gold and silver mountains shining together in high-quality development."
Under the warm winter sun, Taihu Lake water is clear and green, and the rippling waves are rippling.
The incoming water entering Taihu Lake must first "take a bath". Taohu and Huihu are the "pre-storey" and "purification pools" of Taihu Lake, and the ecological location is important. Jiangsu has issued a three-year action plan for the system management of Changdang Lake in Qinghu, completing the clearance of 3.22 square kilometers of circle ditches in Taohu area, restoration of 3.59 square kilometers of wetlands, and 5.5 million cubic meters of dredging of Qinghu. Ecological floating islands and underwater forests were built in Changdang Lake. Wujin District, Changzhou City, where Weihu is located, has set up four defense lines, source, factory, network and river, guarding them at all levels. In the past three years, the phosphorus content of Weihu has dropped by 36.4%.
In 2023, Jiangsu issued a new round of comprehensive governance action plan for Taihu Lake, adhered to the combination of "points, lines and surfaces", took source control and pollution control and phosphorus reduction and nitrogen control as the main focus, and coordinated the lakeshore and basin governance, comprehensively established a "phosphorus account book" and "phosphorus list" of phosphorus-related enterprises, and formulated a "one river, one policy" plan for improving water quality standards for 40 rivers.
Do subtraction, improve the emergency prevention and control system of cyanobacteria that combines "blocking, leasing, fishing and controlling", and return the dike to the lake and continue to carry out a new round of lake dredging tasks; do addition, "driving the river to the Pacific", increase the basin water resources supply, promote basin ecological restoration, expand environmental capacity, and build an ecological wetland circle around the lake.
The water quality is good, and all things are born. Jushanwan on Xishan Island, Wuzhong District, Suzhou City was once a mine that had been abandoned for many years. Nowadays, metasequoia, crabapple, osmanthus and other plants are lush, and man and nature live in harmony.
The changes in Jushanwan are due to mechanism innovation. "After enterprises cause ecological damage, they can choose to replant and re-green, proliferate and release, and go to the island to repair in a centralized manner." He Liang, head of the Legal Education Section of Wuzhong Ecological Environment Bureau of Suzhou, introduced that at present, a total of 6,740 trees were planted, 50,000 fish fry were stocked, and 5 water bodies were comprehensively renovated, and the ecological benefits were continuously amplified.
It's not just Wuzhong. Liyang City has built an ecological product trading platform with water ecological capacity as the key, Zhangjiagang City has promoted the transformation of environmental rights into real money, and Yixing City has promoted industrial ecology and ecological industrialization... "Green water and green mountains are gold and silver mountains." In recent years, the Taihu Lake Basin has innovated mechanisms and used rigid guarantees and vivid practices to help the deep governance of shallow lakes and the permanent governance of large lakes.
The "Decision" of the Third Plenary Session of the 20th Central Committee of the Communist Party of China proposed: "Accelerate the improvement and implementation of the concept that green waters and green mountains are gold and silver mountains." In 2024, Jiangsu delivered an answer sheet that complements economic development and ecological civilization construction. "Compared with 2007, the Taihu Lake Basin in Jiangsu has achieved a historic breakthrough in Taihu Lake governance while increasing its population by 32.3%, an urbanization rate increased by 15 percentage points, and an economic growth of 3.3 times." said Shen Jianrong, director of the Jiangsu Provincial Development and Reform Commission.
