Abird's-eye view of Ma'anshan.	Nanhu Lake .	Angling at Yushan Lake.

MA’ANSHAN is a city built on its iron and steel industry. Its name has been synonymous with the industrial syndicate - Ma’anshan Iron and Steel Company Limited - for decades. But in addition to its iron and steel industrial prominence, Ma’anshan has a growingly green ethos. It has been named Clean City of China, Garden City of China and National Paradigm for Environment Protection. It has also received international awards for Improving Living Environment.

The city’s green achievement is partly attributable to the economic strength generated and sustained by its steel industry, and partly to its environmentally aware local government. Achieving environmental goals takes both funds and resolution. Ma’anshan’s pleasant living environment is the fruit of endeavors by its mayor and residents that have been actualized by urban planners, gardeners and sculptors.

Ma’anshan citizens agree that their municipal leaders’ habit of taking morning and evening exercises in their local communities gives residents a good opportunity to express their opinions and dissatisfaction as regards urban construction and municipal management.

Mayor Yao Yuzhou moved to a community east of Jiashan Park in 2006. The park, having since been his morning jogging site, is also a platform for local opinion. When, one morning, he chatted with a few other joggers on the summit of Jiashan, one senior citizen spoke warmly about the great improvements in Ma’anshan’s living environment. He was particularly appreciative of the environmental projects on the Jiashan and Yushan hills and Yushan Lake. He, however, went on to suggest that the summit of Jiashan Hill be evened out a little for the convenience of morning joggers and exercisers. Other locals in the company chimed in with more proposals, such as the building of a viewing platform, as the hill stands high at the city center, and sports apparatus with all the associated facilities.

Some days later Mayor Yao and the heads of relevant departments went to Jiashan Hill to discuss these suggestions. The municipal construction commission and gardening department subsequently allocated RMB 700,000 to the hilltop renovation project: Open ground and paths were smoothed and paved, two wooden viewing platforms were set up on the east and west sides and sports facilities installed. The entrance to the air-raid shelter at the waist of the hill was converted into a terrace, complete with a teahouse, and the Sanying Pagoda in Yushan Lake Park is now a recreation center.

Vice Mayor Long Lihai, who is responsible for municipal construction, takes his evening walk around Zhenquyuan public park near his home. The people he meets there frequently voice discontent at the lack of open space for exercisers in the square due to a flowerbed at its center. After Long Lihai discussed the matter with the municipal construction and gardening departments the flowerbed was redesigned and rebuilt to allow more open space. These are two examples of the close relationship between municipal leaders and their constituency.

The municipal government built the Yushan and Jiashan free parks in 2005, an endeavor, as they put it, “to return the fruits of urban construction to citizens.” Later the Yushan Lake and Children’s Park also became free parks. Today, almost all public recreational places in the city are open to citizens free of charge.

The city’s landscape engineers and gardeners are fully aware that a greening project is a long-term task. Also, that they cannot expect to achieve perfection, only improvement. Suggestions from the public help them to identify problems and make timely improvements.

The Yushan Lake Park Administration, for example, accepted public criticism of cars being allowed into the park. Having posted notices and park attendants at its entrances to stop cars driving in, the administrators obeyed the new regulations they had themselves imposed by parking their cars outside the park and walking to their office. The park now has a cleaner, car-free environment.

The Children’s Park, meanwhile, acted on proposals from local citizens that its trees be “adopted.” The city administration promptly raised and promoted a “Love Green and Nurse Green” adoption plan. So far, more than 10 work units and 100 citizens have “adopted” lawns and trees in the park.

The southeastern corner of the Yushan Park adjoins two residential communities, hundreds of whose residents are regular joggers up and down the hill there. They brought up the matter of paving a path on the southeastern slope. The park wasted no time in raising the RMB 200,000 necessary to build a 120-m-long, 1.5-m-wide path, as well as pavilions along the way.

The municipal gardening department has established an effective green construction and management system characterized by “mass participation.” It works on the basis of a smooth-running information-flow mechanism that includes Measures to Solicit Rational Suggestions and Measures for Inviting Gardening and Green Construction Projects. The mechanism begins with “citizens’ needs and requirements” and ends with “citizens’ assessments and satisfaction rate.” Manned by volunteer supervisors, it encompasses mass activities, such as “Ideas for My Garden,” designed to motivate local gardeners and environmentalists. The gardening department regards complaints and expressions of dissatisfaction as a means to isolating and rectifying problems. Its hotline and website serve as complaint platforms in this regard.

“Building a city with a good living environment relies not only on the government, but on the entire citizenship.” This is the oft-heard mantra of Ma’anshan’s local gardening administrators and workers.

In recent years the municipal gardening administration has worked hard to improve its management and work efficiency in order to build Ma’anshan into an ecological garden city. It institutionalized a standardized management system in November 2005 that pinpoints targets, procedures and implementation measures and standards.

One of the administration measures particularly applauded by the public is the evaluation of its own work by unaffiliated parties. Since January 2006, the administration has charged 21 volunteer supervisors with keeping an eye on gardening in process, as well as maintenance and hygiene, staff service attitude, and management standard. This measure has enhanced the sense of responsibility and work efficiency of the gardening administrators and workers, and generally raised public green awareness.