If the overall annual water quality falls below a benchmark standard agreed by both sides, Anhui, which lies upstream, must compensate Zhejiang 100 million yuan ($15 million) to cover its water treatment costs.
If the overall annual water quality is above the standard, it means Anhui has fulfilled its responsibility in protecting the river and Zhejiang must give Anhui 100 million yuan to help it cover the costs of its ecological preservation work.
In addition, the central government sets aside 300 million yuan each year to support Anhui's efforts in maintaining water quality.
Thanks to Anhui's measures, water flowing to Zhejiang has met the quality standard every year since 2012, which means it qualifies to receive annual financial support from both Zhejiang and the central government. "Every year, the Xin'an River pours about 6 billion metric tons of clean water into Qiandao Lake, costing Zhejiang only 100 million yuan. It is really a good deal," Nie said. Last year, Zhejiang's average per capita GDP was $12,635; in Anhui it was $5,835.
Nie believes the Xin'an River management model offers valuable lessons for the protection of other big rivers, allowing better-off downstream provinces to help the often less-developed upstream regions protect local ecology and environment.
Development gap
The development gap is more pronounced on longer rivers such as the Yangtze, which has Qinghai province at one end and Jiangsu province at the other. Qinghai is more than seven times larger than Jiangsu in area, while Jiangsu's economy is about 30 times that of Qinghai.
Experts believe it is imperative for the central authorities to implement the interprovincial ecological compensation mechanism to help ecologically fragile places like Qinghai－where both the Yellow River and Yangtze start－to step up their efforts in ecological preservation.
In April 2014, Zhejiang suggested that the working mechanism with Anhui be continued, and both sides agreed to increase the compensation to 200 million yuan each year. The water quality benchmark standard was increased by 7 percentage points from the previous level.
Excluding the compensating funds from Zhejiang and the central government, Anhui's expenditure to ensure the Xin'an River water quality met the agreed standards was 8.79 billion yuan at the end of 2016. This mostly went toward village pollution control, urban household rubbish and wastewater treatment, industrial pollution control and the comprehensive treatment and ecological restoration of key watercourses.
Since 2011, the Anhui provincial government has placed greater weight on Huangshan's ecological protection work than on its economic growth in the evaluation of the city government's performance. The changes have had a huge impact on the lives of the Huangshan people.
An awareness of environmental protection is now ingrained in the minds of not only civil servants but all the inhabitants of the city.
The city has shut down more than 170 polluting mills, relocated more than 90 enterprises, and upgraded about 510 industrial projects to meet the strict environmental standards.
