SHANGHAI aims to be a national model city for environmental protection before World Expo 2010, the top official of the city's environmental protection authority said yesterday.
"The city has reached 24 of the 32 standards established by the central government," Zhang Quan, director of the Shanghai Environmental Protection Bureau, said in a radio interview.
The State Environmental Protection Administration, the predecessor of the Ministry of Environmental Protection, issued the standards in 1997.
Sixty-seven cities and five districts of municipalities have been named national model cities for environmental protection as of last year.
They include Shanghai's Pudong New Area and Minhang District.
The city aims to meet the standards in all districts within two years and plans to do better than other cities across the country, Zhang said.
Shanghai's good-air day rate is 85 percent, five percentage points more than the national standard, Zhang added.
The official said green space can be found in 38 percent of the city.
He added that people can see green land on average every 500 meters within the Inner Ring Road, and the city had eliminated admission fees to most downtown parks.
The government also plans to regularly monitor the emissions of industrial boilers.