Earlier this month, during a round of surprise inspections,
Deputy Minister of the Ministry of Environmental Protection Zhao
Yangmin publicly shamed the city officials of Langfang,
a city in Hebei province, for failing to take action after a severe
pollution warning was issued on April 2, 2017. Deputy
Minister Zhao also ordered a production halt at companies in
Langfang which had failed to meet emissions control requirements or
had submitted falsified emissions data, blaming "some local
governments that do not take emergency response
seriously."
The inspection was part of a 28-city inspection campaign by the
Ministry of Environmental Protection, the largest the Ministry has
ever undertaken. The inspections involve 5,600 inspectors and will
run through March of 2018, focusing on the provinces surrounding
Beijing and Tianjin, where some of China's worst air pollution
is found. Officials determined to be lax in their enforcement
efforts could receive lower ratings in
