On May 18, Vice Minister Zhai Qing stressed at the mobilization meeting for “the third round air pollution inspection in Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei region and surrounding area” that the inspection teams should follow the work plans, urge the local Party committees and governments to fulfill their environmental protection responsibilities, and double check each of the prominent environmental problems supposed to be rectified by local areas and monitored by the Ministry. Also, they should strictly observe the disciplines and the honesty regulations, and mind personal safety.

On May 17, 23 inspection teams checked a total of 339 enterprises (institutions) and spotted environmental problems in 252 of them, taking up around 74.3 percent. Of the problematic enterprises, 94 were small sporadic polluters, 26 failed to install pollution control facilities, 19 failed to keep such facilities in normal operations, 24 had VOCs control problems, 21 did not take sound flying dust control measures, and 68 had other problems.

The Ministry is about to send another six inspection teams to carry out the weeklong third round inspection in 23 cities including Beijing, Shijiazhuang, Jinan, and Zhengzhou, in an effort to maintain the momentum of the ongoing air pollution inspection in Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei region and surrounding area, urge local areas to make rectifications, and make sure the inspections are effective. The inspection teams will lay the emphasis on urging the local governments to itemize the prominent environmental problems and the small sporadic polluters on the Ministry's monitoring lists, and to solve them against the checklist.

The six inspection teams will be headed for the 23 target cities on May 19 to check the 1,243 problems that were put on the Ministry's three monitoring lists.