We most welcome you to come to Hangzhou to attend the Second Meeting of the China Council for International Cooperation on Environment and Development (CCICED). An ancient Chinese saying goes: there is a paradise in the heaven, and the paradise on earth is Suzhou and Hangzhou. How do you find Hangzhou, from the point of view of environment? I sincerely hope that the city will not be polluted and neither will all other parts of China, I would very much like to have your opinions and suggestions.

　　(Mr. Marcel Masse, Mr. Law Hieing Ding and Sir Crisping Tickell spoke, and made suggestions to the Chinese Government concerning issues such as agriculture, energy, transportation, toxic and harmful materials, public environment awareness. environmental education to youth and women. pricing polices of resources and biodiversity, etc..)

　　I have just listened to the opinions and suggestions from these gentlemen. I believe that you have had a very successful meeting. The Chinese Government has consistently attached importance to pollution control and management, as well as to the improvement of environment. Much of the political report at the 14th National Conference of the Chinese Communist Party was devoted to environmental protection, reiterating that environmental protection is a basic state policy and one of the ten strategic tasks for China in its refer, and construction the 1990's, We have always held that economic construction, urban and rural construction and environmental construction should be planned, put into operation and developed at the same time, in order to achieve unified economic, social and environmental benefits.

　　A large part of the present Chinese leaders have had an engineering technologies education background. For instance, I studied electrical engineering, Premier Li Peng learned hydro-electric engineering, Vice Premier Zhu Rongji majored in electrical engineering, and Vice Premier Zou Jiahua in machinery tool industry, Because of our experience in work, we feel very strongly about environmental pollution once was the manager of a power plant, The issue of dust removal is of great concern. We adopted many measures to address the problem with a view to reducing atmospheric pollution, During the time when I was the factory manager, we were already using electricity to remove dust. I also worked as the head of an institute which did research on electricity generation by nuclear energy, While carrying out re search on electricity generation by nuclear energy, we give special heed to safety prevented from polluting the environment.

　　I went over all of the related materials last night, and feel that you have made quite a number of very good suggestions. Take utilization of energy, if we could change transportation of coal to transportation of electricity, we could bury will save efforts in the process of transportation and, meanwhile, make it possible for a big improvement in atmospheric quality .At the last Plenary Session of the 8th National People's Congress, which was convened not long ago, I participated in the discussion of the representatives of Shanxi Province. Shanxi is the biggest coal-producing province in China, where efforts are being made to build large-sized power stations for the realization of exporting only electricity through on-the-spot coal processing.

　　I have read a great number of English novels, all of which mentioned London as a foggy city. But when I visited U.K. in 1998,I found that the water of the River Thames had become clear and that fish had come back. Although I was a university student there in 1945, the river was quite clean. Now, however, it has turned dark and is giving out offensive odour. We are going to spend 1.6billion yuan on the treatment of the industrial and domestic waste water discharged into the river, which will then be led into the sea, It is hopeful that we can go fishing one day on the Suzhou River if that if that is accomplished.

　　I have noticed that participants at the meeting have raised very good points on environmental monitoring. Talking about environmental monitoring and periodical monitoring. When I was serving as the leader of Shanghai, there was an enterprise which produced very serious pollution: you could easily smell the odour, Later, a special monitoring car was sent and stayed there for three days. The fact was gone. After the car left, however, the smell came back and became even worse. This show s that the enterprise was cheating us. Monitoring is an important means for environmental management and only when continuous and periodical monitoring are combined with strict management, can environmental quality be accurately reflected and environmental management be well-targeted and further enhanced, By these examples of my personal experience, I want to prove that your suggestions and recommendations are of great value.

　　It is inevitable that China's economic development is connected with that of the world. And there is no doubt that China's environmental construction in its process of economic development is most in connected with that of the world. The Chinese Government willing to establish extensive cooperation with the international community in the field of environmental protection, in order to upgrade the work in China, which will in turn contribute to the work improvement of the global environment.