Underneath APEC Blue Sky

In recent years， China was speeding up the pace of the ecological environment protection. The country issued and implemented a new environmental law， perfecting the governance and increasing penalties for infringements of the environmental law， while it strengthened the collaboration in the regional atmospheric pollution prevention and control. So far， the efforts to fight against air pollution seem to be paying off.

In the first half of this year， Beijing and six provinces and municipalities surrounding the capital saw a decrease in days of heavy pollution. The APEC blue， a newly-coined term referring to the brief appearance of a blue sky because of the pollution limits during the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation meeting， became the countrys newest catch word.

At the welcome banquet of the 21st APEC meeting， China president Xi Jinping said he believed that the APEC blue will stay long through unremitting efforts. The statement made people to step up efforts to protect the ecological environment in China with full of expectation and confidence.

The appearance of the APEC blue proved the fog and haze were controllable with determined efforts to put the governance measures in place. However， it needs a standardized and orderly legal environment and a long-term mechanism to make the APEC blue stay forever.

Firstly， China should establish a long-term effective legal mechanism for environmental protection. To achieve the goal， the country should perfect the rules of the environmental protection law， establish an effective cross-regional collaboration mechanism across the nation， and roll out legal rules targeted for environmental governance to mandate enterprises to discharge pollutants in line with the standard by means of the law rules. Besides， it should incorporate local officials haze governance achievements into their performance index system， and define responsibilities of government functional departments at all levels， in a bid to make government departments become the main body responsible for the haze control.

Secondly， it should introduce a market-oriented regulating mechanism. The ecological environmental governance should not just rely on the governments mandatory measures， but also need coordination with main activity bodies such as individuals and enterprises. It should give full play to the role of price lever. For example， the individuals and units also should be guided to reduce motor vehicle emissions through the price lever as government subsidies for the desul-furization and denitration of coal-fired enterprises fuel gas. By means of tax， financing and others， pollution costs of polluting industry and enterprises will be increased which will incentive the development of cleaning industry and enterprises， phase out heavily-polluting enterprises and smooth the ecological environment governance.

Thirdly， China should establish a strict accountability system. Without accountability， the effect of the policy is impossible. Currently， the punishment is not strong enough， leading to rampant pollution by enterprises despite repeated prohibition. Only with hard-hitting measures， Chinas environmental pollution control can get out of the weird circle of “control – rebound”. At the same time， the country should strengthen responsibility investigation for local governments to make them strictly enforce the law and toe the line.

In addition， individuals also should take the initiative to fulfill their social responsibilities， actively participate in the public haze control， and adopt a green lifestyle by changing some details in life， such as more use of clean energy， public transportation tools， etc. Only in this way can all Chinese live underneath the APEC blue sky with green hills and blue waters forever.