126 million, Henan "gambling" won Shandong, but there was no loser

Who develops who protects and who benefits who compensate

Recently, Shandong pays 126 million yuan of ecological compensation in Henan.

At a press conference held by the Shandong Provincial Government News Office on July 5, Shandong announced the results of "gambling" last year. Henan "gamble" won Shandong, and Shandong fulfilled 126 million yuan in ecological compensation funds in Henan Province.

In 2021, the Shandong Province in Henan Province and the downstream of the Yellow River reached an agreement, and signed the "Yellow River Basin (Yulu Section) horizontal ecological protection compensation agreement" (hereinafter referred to as the "Agreement").

The "Agreement" stipulates that the average annual value of Liuzhuang Guo's section of Liuzhuang Guo's control over the two provinces is based on categories III. Each improved water quality category, Shandong gives 60 million compensation to Henan; on the contrary, every woof category worsens, Henan gives 60 million Shandong.

In addition, if the annual index of the three key pollutants of the section decreases at a percentage point of the year, Shandong will give Henan 1 million compensation; on the contrary, every 1 percentage point increases, Henan will give Shandong 1 million.

This means that the highest compensation of this "gambling" can reach 100 million yuan, and many netizens compare this "agreement" to the realistic version of "Lu Yu has an appointment".

Recently, the "Gambling" agreement has been implemented for one year. As the water quality of the Yellow River always maintained above the second type of water, Shandong, as the beneficiary of ecological interests, paid 126 million yuan of ecological compensation funds to Henan.

"Gambling contract" of power and responsibility equal

The Yellow River has passed through 9 provinces and regions, with a total length of 5464 kilometers. It has a number of important ecological function areas such as the Yellow River and many important ecological function areas such as Sanjiangyuan and Qilian Mountain. It is an important energy, chemical, raw material and basic industrial base in China, and has a very important position in my country's economic and social development and ecological security.

Yellow River Cultural Park, Zhengzhou City, Henan Province. Figure/Figure insect creativity

However, since the 1990s, the Yellow River Basin has faced outstanding ecological environment problems. The water quality of the basin and the air quality of the provinces and regions are lower than the national average. The main tributaries have been severely contaminated, and the dry flow is generally polluted.

Shandong and Henan are two provinces adjacent to the Yellow River Basin. As a relative downstream province, the two provinces have been deeply harmed, and there is also a phenomenon of power and responsibility.

"On the same time, the downstream sewage is pushed to the upstream, accusing the upstream of the upstream, and the water is too bad; the upstream is also drained while pushing the water quality responsibility to the upper section. Once described this scene.

At the same time, the Yellow River Basin ecosystem is fragile, and once it is destroyed, recovery is extremely difficult.

In order to solve this problem, the state has set up a "online water quality monitoring system" on the interception of important rivers and municipalities in various provinces, autonomous regions and municipalities to set the assessment goals for each section. The section of Liu Zhuangguo is the cross -province water quality monitoring section of Henan and Shandong provinces.

In 2020, the four departments of the Ministry of Finance, the Ministry of Ecology and Environment, the Ministry of Water Resources, and the State Forestry Bureau issued the "Pilot Implementation Plan for Supporting and Guiding the Yellow River to establish a horizontal ecological compensation mechanism", which required to follow the "protection responsibilities and co -governance, co -governance of the basin environment, and co -governance of the basin environment, and co -governance in the basin environment, and co -governance in the basin environment, and co -governance of the basin environment. The principle of ecological benefits sharing "explores the establishment of the horizontal ecological compensation model with demonstration.

After that, Shandong, the downstream province of the Yellow River Basin, took the initiative to connect Henan, and signed the first provincial and horizontal ecological protection compensation agreement with it in May 2021 with it. Based on the results of Liuzhuang Guo's control section water quality monitoring, the horizontal ecological compensation of the Yellow River Basin was compensated Explore the mechanism.

Compared with the types of environmental protection governance, river water ecological protection requires particularly high collaboration between upstream and downstream places. The horizontal ecological compensation mechanism of the basin can achieve complementary interests through negotiation and negotiations between the upstream and downstream local governments of the basin, thereby coordinating and balanced the interest relationship between ecological protection areas and ecological benefit areas.

The special feature of the "Lu Yu has an appointment" ecological compensation agreement is that the "gambling agreement" was introduced. It is not only a one -way to agreed that the beneficiary of ecological protection must give the protector a certain compensation, but also agreed that the party who does not meet the standards must pay the "victim" to compensate for the same.

In this way, ecological compensation has become more fair, ensuring the power and responsibilities of both parties, etc., and also strengthened the protective party's ecological repair motivation and enthusiasm.

In order to "bet" this agreement, Henan actively carried out the governance of ecological environment of the Yellow River Basin, formulated and implemented the standard of water pollutant emissions in the Yellow River Basin, added indicators of water pollutant emissions, and implemented a "one river, one strategy" on the key tributary of the Yellow River. Remediation has implemented nearly a hundred comprehensive rectification projects, and in the basin, it has taken the lead in completing ultra -low emissions and transformation of enterprises such as steel and cement.

Taking the python river as an example, as a tributary of the left bank of the Yellow River, it flows through Jiyuan City and Jiaozuo City, Henan, and injected the Yellow River in Wuxian County, Jiaozuo City. The monitoring data of the Jiyuan Ecological and Environment Bureau shows that the water quality of Nanguanzhuang in the outward section of the out -of -the -faceted surface of the Pills was a Class V and inferior V. After governance, it can now be stabilized to class IV, and some water quality indicators can reach Class III.

As for Shandong, while establishing and implementing the provincial and horizontal compensation mechanism of the Yellow River Basin, the horizontal ecological compensation mechanism of the entire river basin has been established in the province.

In September 2021, all 301 cross -county sessions in Shandong signed a horizontal compensation agreement. As of the end of May 2022, a total of 324 million yuan in accommodation funds was paid by the county's inter -county horizontal ecological compensation. Among them, the downstream compensation upstream is 217 million yuan, and the upstream compensation is 107 million yuan.

The compensation amount is greatly exceeded the amount of compensation, reflecting the overall water quality of the upstream. Yu Wenxuan, director of the Institute of Environmental Resources and Law of the University of Political Science and Law, told China News Weekly that from the results, the "gambling" agreement enabled the two parties to win a win -win situation.

He said that on the one hand, the ecological environmental protection of the Yellow River Basin has achieved remarkable results, and the water quality and water quality of the province's boundary in the province have improved significantly; on the other hand, Henan Province has also obtained ecological compensation funds paid by Shandong Province, achieving economic benefits and achievements. The unity of ecological benefits is "an innovation of the horizontal ecological compensation method of the inter -provincial river basin."

18 provinces have signed across provincial ecological compensation agreements

It is understood that the watershed ecological compensation is a positive exploration in the field of domestic ecological protection in recent years.

As early as the end of 2010, the Ministry of Finance and the former Ministry of Environmental Protection allocated 50 million yuan in Anhui Province to start funds, and made Xin'anjiang as the first pilot of compensation for water environment compensation for cross -provincial river basin.

In 2011, the people's governments of the six cities and districts of Shaanxi and Gansu signed the "Framework Agreement on the Environmental Protection City Alliance of the Weihe River Basin", and then a series of watershed protection regulations were successively introduced.

On December 20, 2016, the Ministry of Finance and other four departments jointly issued the "Guiding Opinions on Accelerating the Establishment of the Compensation Mechanism of Horizontal Ecological Protection of upstream and downstream in the basin", which proposed that by 2020, the upstream and downstream horizontal ecology of the watershed in the administrative area of ​​the provinces (autonomous regions, and municipalities) proposed that by 2020 The protection compensation mechanism will be basically established; by 2025, the scope of the pilot scope of horizontal ecological protection compensation for the upstream and downstream of multiple provinces will be further expanded.

At present, with the support of the Central Finance, the Ministry of Ecology and Environment has coordinated 18 related provinces and signed 13 cross -province's horizontal ecological compensation agreement. Half of which has completed at least one round of compensation agreement.

Among them, the Xin'anjiang Basin has completed the third round of basin compensation. At present, the two provinces of Anhui and Zhejiang are undergoing negotiation agreements.

Zhang Bo, chief engineer of the Ministry of Ecology and Environment, and Director of the Department of Water Ecological and Environment, said at the first routine press conference of the Ministry of Ecology and Environment in 2022, "The Ministry of Ecology and Environment will actively cooperate with the Ministry of Finance, continue to support the construction of ecological protection compensation mechanisms, encourage localities to encourage localities Try it first, and promote the compensation for ecological protection of the basin to become an important starting point for the green development of the basin, and continuously improve the level of watershed management. "

However, there are still many challenges in promoting the construction of a basin ecological compensation mechanism.

Yu Wenxuan said that my country has not yet formulated a special law for ecological protection compensation, and the laws involving ecological protection compensation are scattered in various single laws, such as Article 34 of the Environmental Protection Law and Article 76 of the Yangtze River Protection Law. , Article 7 of the Forest Law, etc. Most of these regulations are principles, advocacy, and encouragement, and lack of issues such as scope, objects, subject delineation, funding sources, compensation standards, and fund management of ecological compensation.

In recent years, relevant departments have also introduced some policies or legal documents for ecological protection compensation, such as the "Opinions of the General Office of the State Council on improving the compensation mechanism of ecological protection", "National Development and Reform Commission, the Ministry of Ecology and Environment, and the Ministry of Water Resources on Promoting the establishment of Taihu Lake Basin "Guidance Opinions of Ecological Protection Compensation Mechanism", "Opinions on Deepening the Reform of Ecological Protection Compensation System", "Implementation Plan for Supporting the Establishment of Horizontal Ecological Protection Compensation Mechanisms in the Full Basin of the Yangtze River" and so on.

Some analysts have pointed out that these documents have important promotion of the exploration of ecological protection compensation mechanisms, but their contents are mostly recommended and encouraged, and the level of legal effect is also low.

Yu Wenxuan told China News Weekly that the most common way for the current ecological protection compensation of the basin is fund compensation, that is, the beneficiary pays the corresponding currency to the compensation. This kind of compensation method is not easy to ensure the long -term and stability of the ecological compensation effect. Whether the compensation funds are in place will directly affect the implementation effect.

At the same time, some ecological interests are difficult to quantify through currency money, which also increases the difficulty of determining scientific and reasonable compensation standards. "The ways and procedures for ecological protection compensation also lack a clear specification." Yu Wenxuan said.

"Who develops and who protects and who benefits who compensate"

How to explore the ecological compensation model, the establishment of cross -regional environmental protection governance cooperation mechanisms for local conditions have always been the focus of attention.

Zhang Bo believes that since the implementation of the ecological compensation mechanism of the basin, the quality of the cross -border section of the water environment has risen steadily, and the collaborative ability of upstream and downstream of the basin has improved significantly. The effect of booting green development in upstream areas with ecological compensation has also begun to appear.

For example, the Xin'anjiang Basin has established the first green development fund across the province. Anhui and Zhejiang provinces are exploring the joint construction of the green industry cooperation zone of Xin'anjiang Basin to explore the "hematopoietic" ecological compensation mechanism. "It is not simply compensation for funds, but also through industrial cooperation to form an ecological compensation mechanism of" hematopoietic "." Zhang Bo said.

For the standards of ecological compensation, there are suggestions to introduce a unified compensation standards by the state. Zhang Bo believes that the actual situation and the situation in various basins are very different, and the compensation standards must vary from place. "The upstream and downstream often controversy the compensation standards, and it is unlikely to use the national unified standards to resolve this complex problem."

"The current approach is some points that are easier to accept from the upstream and downstream of the basin as the compensation standard. For example The issue of concern is to carry out some compensation in the protection of water sources. "Zhang Bo believes that it can be easy and difficult, and gradually improve. In order to better promote the smooth development of horizontal ecological compensation, He Daixin, director of the Finance Research Office of the Institute of Finance and Economics of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, has suggested that the market mechanism is used to stimulate the enthusiasm of ecological protection.

"The ecological protection compensation system should achieve a better combination of effective markets and the government. The compensation itself reflects economic costs and benefits, and no longer completely solve the problem of ecological protection through government methods. Instead, it is implemented through more transparent and quantified market mechanisms. Establish a multi -party compensation mechanism, "he said.

In Wenxuan's view, in the exploration of the horizontal ecological compensation mechanism in the region and the basin, you can try the methods or combinations of policy compensation, physical compensation, technical compensation, purchasing services, talent training, etc. to achieve complementary complementary methods.

At the same time, the rights and obligations between the protection of the main body and the beneficiary should be focused on the definition of the right and obligations of the beneficiary. Unity, benefits and compensation are equal, and achieve a win -win situation.

In addition, Yu Wenxuan also emphasized the need to play legislation and promote the role of legislation, and further improve the provisions of compensation objects, compensation methods, compensation channels, compensation standards and assessment standards, and fund management. A balanced ecological interests between regions and basins are achieved by legislation, and a long -term and efficient ecological environment governance model is promoted from the legal level.

"It should also strengthen the management of ecological protection compensation funds, and also stipulates legal responsibility for the abilities of illegal misappropriation or compensation funds, and strengthen accountability." He said.

Author: Chen Shulian ([email protected])

Edit: Sun Xiaobo

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