Environmental violation reporting, reward measures introduced

The latest revision of the Guiyang Eco-environmental Violation Reporting and Incentive Measures (Interim) was recently released in an effort to strengthen social supervision, punish illegal acts that harm the environment according to the law, continuously improve the quality of the environment, and encourage the public to actively participate in environmental protection.

The measures divide reported environmental violations into five levels according to the severity and nature of the violations. After deciding on the punishment for the offender, informants will be offered rewards.

According to the level and category of different illegal acts, rewards will range from 100 yuan ($15) to 50,000 yuan.

In addition, a one-time reward of up to 200,000 yuan will be given to whistleblowers who report to the environment department for the first time of an environmental violation resulting in particularly serious environmental pollution or having a particularly severe social impact.

The new measures differ from before in that the scope of reward reporting has been expanded, more flexible reporting channels such as WeChat reporting and online reporting have been added, the reward standard has been improved, and WeChat transfer and other reward transfer methods have been added.