Datong has been recently honored as a provincial environmental protection model city.

Since 2008, Datong government has carried out a series of projects to improve the city’s competitiveness.

The city’s administration launched a special operation to reduce the pollution caused by electric, coal, steel, cement, chemical and building material industries. As a result, the city’s atmospheric pollution achieved the best improvement across the province in 2009.

This year, the city has had close to 130 days of first-class weather conditions, an increase of 30 percent year-on-year.

Datong has also controlled river pollution and increased its greenery. By the end of 2010, the city had 34 million square meters of greenery, nearly 8 square meters per capita.

Hu Yuting, the city vice mayor, said the honorable titles would encourage Datong to put more effort into environmental protection.