Villagers remove water weed in Gusheng Village in Dali, southwest China's Yunnan Province, Sept. 14, 2020. (Photo by Chen Xinbo/Xinhua)
The largest freshwater lake on the Yunnan-Guizhou Plateau, Dianchi Lake used to be one of the most polluted lakes in China, with its water quality graded Class V for a long time in the 1990s, the worst level in the country's water quality grading system.
Years of restoration efforts by the government and the public, including pollution control, water replenishment and wetland restoration, are helping the lake regain its lost luster.
Its surface water quality improved to Class IV in 2018, the best in 30 years, and has remained at the level over the past two years, according to the Dianchi Lake administration bureau.
The water quality of 17 rivers, making up nearly half of the waterways entering Dianchi Lake, reached Class III level or even better in 2020, compared with just five rivers in 2015, statistics from the Kunming municipal ecology and environment bureau showed.
Fu Wen, head of the Dianchi Lake administration bureau, said they will follow Xi's instructions to step up pollution control, ecological restoration and intelligent management of the lake to further improve its water quality.
