China's environmental protection agency, in a review of the country's progress in the last year, says its plans to spend massive amounts on reducing its drastic pollution problem will not be undermined by economic difficulties. The agency's director, Xie Zhenhua, said China intended to spend more than $50 bn in the next three years in an effort to get rampant air and water pollution under control. He said increased emphasis would be placed on dealing with acid rain, which now affects 30% of the country and has caused concern among China's neighbours. Duncan Hewitt reports from Beijing:

China's massive environmental problems are the legacy both of the polluting heavy industries built in the 1950s and of the last 15 years of rapid and often unregulated economic development. Environmentalists say many rivers are dying and the rapid growth in the number of cars has made the country one of the world's worst polluters.

In the capital Beijing surveys show some 70% of children have been affected by lead pollution. Xie Zhenhua, the director of China's National Environmental Protection Agency, says progress is being made though, citing successes in the mass campaign to clean up the Huai River and the closure of some 65,000 polluting enterprises in 1996 and 1997.

Mr Xie told reporters in Beijing that China would now focus on tackling acid rain, which he said affected 30% of the country. He said China was working together with neighbouring countries like South Korea and Japan, which are particularly concerned about the impact of Chinese pollution on their own environments.

Mr Xie said new mapping projects would be introduced and more cities would introduce unleaded petrol. Environmentalists acknowledge that China has now introduced some of the world's toughest environmental laws, yet they say full implementation remains a distant goal and concerns have been raised about the country's ability to continue closing polluting factories when it already faces a massive unemployment crisis.