Ningbo in East China's Zhejiang province recently has been rated as an outstanding city in the province's drive to beautify its environment.

As of the end of 2019, a total of six districts (counties) from the city had been designated demonstration districts (counties) for ecological civilization construction at or above the provincial level. 

Last year, a number of laws and regulations were formulated in Ningbo, covering a variety of aspects like environmental pollution prevention and treatment, as well as domestic garbage sorting. 

The city has also actively mobilized residents to contribute their ideas on tackling environmental problems. In 2019, more than 50 conferences were held across the city, with 2,840 enterprises and more than 80,000 residents attending, which helped solve 386 environmental problems. 

In addition, the city has shown strong results in pollution treatment.

In 2019, the city rectified 2,022 polluting enterprises, as well as phased out 4,039 diesel vehicles and 216 enterprises with outdated production capacity. A total of 4.59 billion yuan ($665.2 million) was also invested in sewage treatment.

Official data showed that the city's spending on energy conservation and environmental protection efforts in 2019 increased by 57.4 percent over the previous year.

A total of 40 residential communities from Ningbo have been designated provincial models for household garbage classification. The garbage sorting system has been promoted in more than 85 percent of the administrative villages in the city, while the household waste recycling utilization rate has reached 86 percent in its urban areas.

The city has also completed renovation on over 130 public toilets in scenic areas.