The Planning Environmental Impact Assessment regulation, or EIA, a draft of which is now available for comment, is likely to be officially released this year, a senior environmental official said on the weekend.
Yang Chaofei, director of the policy, law and regulations department of the Ministry of Environmental Protection, told a forum jointly held with Greenpeace that the feedback process on the draft amendment would be finalized by Wednesday.
The draft will then be submitted to relevant authorities for review before its eventual release by the State Council at the end of the year.
The EIA is intended to ensure that environmental consequences of major development projects, such as chemical and power plants, are identified and assessed before approval is granted.
Planning will be conducted much earlier in the decision-making process than with the project based EIA, which fails to factor environmental impact on a wider geographic area, and is a major step toward sustainable development.
Public and environmental authorities have now been invited to register their opinions on the draft.
China began legislation procedures two years ago.
At the forum, Greenpeace released survey results revealing that among 28 multinational companies operating in China, nearly half shirked standard operating procedures of their countries of origin by not publicizing pollution information.
The 13 companies include ExxonMobil, General Motors, Total, Nissan, and Toyota.
Liu Lican, Greenpeace manager in China, said: "Lack of impetus in China to unveil pollution information by these companies has greatly hurt the Chinese people's right to know about the truth."
（英语点津 Helen 编辑）
About the broadcaster:
Jonathan Stewart is a media and journalism expert from the United States with four years of experience as a writer and instructor. He accepted a foreign expert position with chinadaily.com.cn in June 2007 following the completion of his Master of Arts degree in International Relations and Comparative Politics.
