Production and use of methyl bromide will be greatly reduced in China by 2005, a national plan released yesterday states.

By then, the use and production of methyl bromide in China will be reduced by 20 per cent compared to the average levels used between 1995 and 1998, according to the document.

Methyl bromide, a pesticide that can effectively eliminate pests in soils, is also used to fumigate items such as building materials.

At the same time, however, it is one of many dangerous chemicals that can harm the environment and damage the ozone layer.

The national plan states that with the exception of some critical uses, the methyl bromide production and use in China will be banned by 2015.

The plan was created by experts from both home and abroad in accordance with the Copenhagen Amendment of the Montreal Protocol on Substances that Deplete the Ozone Layer. That accord was agreed to in 1992, when methyl bromide was listed as a controlled substance.

China joined the agreement and has ratified it.

At present there are three methyl bromide producers in China with a production capacity of 8,400 tons a year. Last year, the total output was a little more than 3,500 tons, according to Peking University Professor Hu Jianxin, who took part in designing the plan.

The total use of methyl bromide for fumigation in agriculture was more than 1,800 tons last year, Hu said yesterday at an international workshop on the methyl bromide phase-out plan.

The workshop, held in Beijing, was organized by China's Environmental Protection Administration and the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP).

According to Minister of the State Environmental Protection Administration Xie Zhenhua, China has phased out the largest quantity of ozone depletion substances (ODS) among developing countries.

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