The emphasis will be on improving data transmission and on expanding and automating the system.

The system monitors China's environment situation to detect pollution, particularly of the air and water. The centre then sends reports to the government for use in policy-making and pollution control, said centre officials.

The centre plans to build a few more dozen automatic monitoring stations for air quality across the country, including in some rural areas. The country's air-quality monitoring system already covers more than 170 cities nationwide.

Ding Zhongyuan, the centre's deputy director, said Thursday that attention should be paid to the air quality in China's vast countryside, where the huge population of farmers lives.

Ding said that preparatory work will start in the rural area next year and the monitoring stations are expected to start operating in 2003.

Another 30 automatic monitoring stations for water quality are to be completed by next June with financial support from the World Bank, according to the centre officials.

China currently has 111 automatic monitoring stations for water quality along the country's 10 major rivers.

The planned monitoring stations -- whether for water or air -- are to be automatically operated, according to the centre.

The automatic monitoring stations can provide data on local water and air quality once an hour if necessary, according to centre officials. Manual monitoring, which is still popular in the country's hinterlands, usually offers reference data fewer than 10 times a year.

Ding urged local administrations to provide more funds for the automation process.

Centre officials also emphasized the importance of setting up data-transmission systems in the country's economically backward western regions.

Ding said: "Some prefectural environment monitoring centres in western provinces have only one or two computers."

Little data, therefore, can be sent by computer to Beijing for reference.

The centre promised to further computerize western regions' local monitoring stations and environment protection bureaux, to county level at least, by the end of next year.

At present, China has 2,251 environment monitoring stations across the country. More than 40,000 staff work there.

The stations monitor air and water quality, acid rain, urban noise, sand storms and other ecological problems.

(People's Daily December 20, 2001)