China is stepping up efforts to reduce the worst effects of the pollution caused by its breakneck economic expansion.
The State Council has announced new measures to boost the growth of the environmental protection technology sector.
The BBC reports that Beijing is alarmed by environmental disasters such as chronic urban smog or thousands of rotting pig carcasses in water supplying the city of Shanghai.
Now the State Council has announced that it will accelerate an existing plan to ensure growth of the environmental protection industry by 15% annually by 2015.
Over the next two years it will pay subsidies worth more than $US700 billion and eligible foreign and domestic companies will receive tax breaks.
The move indicates that China is attempting more of a leader in clean technology.
