In 2003, China's fishery ecological environment maintained an overall good quality, said a report on China's fishery eco-environment released in Beijing Tuesday.  

The report, jointly released by the Ministry of Agriculture and the State Environment Protection Administration, admitted that some fishery waters continue to suffer from serious pollution, mainly from nutrient salt, organic substances, oil and heavy metals.

The report said that some spawning and feeding grounds for inshore fishes were still polluted by inorganic nitrogen, active phosphate, oil and other pollutants, but the environmental quality for sea farming areas of fishes was better than in 2002.

In the sediments of marine fishery areas, contents of heavy metals, such as cadmium, copper and zinc, were still high in the Laizhou and Liaodong bays of the Bohai Sea; Hangzhou Bay, Zhoushan inshore area and Yangtze River estuary of the East China Sea; and the Linding area of the Pearl River estuary in the South China Sea.

The environment quality of the spawning and feeding grounds, migration channels of fish in rivers, lakes and reservoirs were better compared with that of 2002, said the report.

In 2003, the country witnessed 1,274 fishery water pollution cases, which caused direct economic losses of 713 million yuan, 325 million yuan more than in 2002.

China began to release such reports since 2001. The report this year was based on the monitoring of 82 key fishery waters, covering a total 16.49 million hectares, or one fourth of China's total fishery waters.

(Xinhua News Agency March 23, 2004)