All town (street) governments (offices) and organ directly under the district:

　　The Interim Measures for Strengthening the Environmental Protection Responsibility of Owners and Managers of Leased Properties in Huadu District has been approved by the Huadu District Government (hereinafter referred to as the district government) and are hereby issued to you for your compliance and implementation. Problems encountered in the implementation shall be directly reported to Huadu Branch Bureau of Guangzhou Municipal Ecological Environment Bureau.

Guangzhou Huadu District People's Government

November 15, 2021

The Interim Measures for Strengthening the Environmental Protection Responsibility of Owners and Managers of Leased Properties in Huadu District

Chapter I General

　　Article 1 In order to promote the owners and managers of leased properties to effectively fulfill their responsibilities for environmental protection, regulate the accountability for environmental damage, and strengthen the source control of pollution prevention and control, in accordance with the Civil Code of the People's Republic of China, Environmental Protection Law of the People's Republic of China, Guangdong Provincial Environmental Protection Regulations, Management Measures for Commercial Housing Leases, Guangzhou Housing Lease Management Regulations, and other applicable laws and regulations, and in the light of the realities of Huadu District, these measures are hereby formulated as follows.

　　Article 2 The owner referred hereto means the owner or the actual controller of the leased property, including natural persons, legal persons, and other organizations.

　　The manager referredhereto means the organization or individual who sublease with the consent of the owner, or who is entrusted by the owner to lease or manage the leased property, including specialized park operations and management organizations, property service enterprises, and various types of sub-lessors.

　　The leased property referredhereto means the property leased by its owner or manager to others for engagement in production and business activities, including land and various buildings, structures, and ancillary facilities.

　　Article 3 These measures shall apply to all property owners and managers within Huadu District who lease their properties to others for engagement in production and business activities.

　　Article 4 Environmental protection is a basic national policy of China, so all organizations and individuals have an obligation to protect the environment. In accordance with the principle that responsibilities are to be undertaken by whomever owns, manages, uses, and benefits from the property, property owners, managers, and lessees shall work together to prevent and reduce environmental pollution and ecological damage and shall bear the corresponding responsibility according to laws for damages caused.

　　Article 5 The Huadu Branch Bureau of the Guangzhou Municipal Ecological Environment Bureau, in charge of organization of the implementation, shall be responsible for the coordination and supervision of the environmental protection of leased properties within its administrative region.

　　Each town (street) shall assist the Huadu Branch Bureau of the Guangzhou Municipal Ecological Environment Bureau to do a good job in the environmental protection of leased properties in its own region.

　　Planning and natural resources, housing and urban-rural construction, water, urban management and comprehensive law enforcement, and other administrative departments and public security organs of Huadu District shall, in accordance with their own division of functions, perform their respective supervisory responsibilities.

　　Article 6 The environmental protection consultation system for Huadu District shall be established and improved, where the Huadu Branch Bureau of the Guangzhou Municipal Ecological Environment Bureau shall provide environmental protection consultation services to owners and managers that will assist them in implementing their responsibilities for environmental protection.

　　Chapter II Environmental Protection Responsibilities of Owners and Managers

　　Article 7Owners and managers shall ensure that leased property meets the standards and requirements of environmental protection and other aspects, and comes with the necessary production and operational conditions.

　　If a manager finds that the environmental protection facilities related to the leased property do not meet the requirements of environmental protection, that manager shall organize the repair or notify the owner for repair in a timely manner.

　　Article 8 Owners and managers shall lease the property for the specified purposes of the stated property and shall not arbitrarily change such purpose. Owners and managers shall not lease the property to lessees for the construction of projects expressly prohibited by China or for engagement in production and business activities affecting the ecological environment; they shall not transfer, lease, nor lend pollution-generating equipment to lessees without corresponding pollution prevention capabilities.

　　Article 9 The leased property contract shall comply with the basic principles of resource conservation and protection of the ecological environment and shall set out relevant provisions of environmental protection responsibilities; owners, managers, and lessees who are to sign a leased property contract shall follow the requirements of the Guangzhou Housing Lease Management Regulations to handle the registration and filing of the housing lease.

　　Article 10 The owner and manager shall, before leasing a property, make clear whether the lessee’s purpose for the leased property and the production processes to be used there comply with environmental protection requirements, and shall urge and cooperate with the lessee to apply for handling environmental protection procedures in accordance with laws; before entry of the lessee’s production equipment into the site, the owner and manager shall verify the lessee's progress of environmental procedures, and refuse to let the lessee move in if such procedures have not been handled; before the project is completed (put into operation), they shall remind and urge the lessee to complete such environmental protection procedures as a sewage discharge permit, acceptance of environmental protection facilities where the facilities for prevention and control of pollution in a construction project shall be designed, constructed and put into operation simultaneously with the main project, etc. If the lessee refuses to do so in accordance with the law, a report shall be promptly submitted to the Huadu Branch Bureau of the Guangzhou Municipal Ecological Environment Bureau and the town (street).

　　Article 11 If the owner and manager find that the lessee's production or operation activities breach China’s relevant provisions by making environmental violations in solid waste disposal, emissions of air pollutants, water pollutants, soil pollutants, noise, light radiation, electromagnetic radiation, other harmful substances, etc., they are obligated to cease the damaging activity and submit a timely report to the Huadu Branch Bureau of the Guangzhou Municipal Ecological Environment Bureau or other relevant administrative departments and town (street).

　　Article 12 The owner and the manager shall assist the Huadu Branch Bureau of the Guangzhou Municipal Ecological Environment Bureau and other relevant administrative departments and towns (streets) to implement an environmental inspection, remediation and enforcement, and other environmental supervision activities over the leased property and the lessee. Owners and managers shall not provide assistance to lessees to commit environmental violations and avoid environmental protection inspections, help them escape, or make false certificates to cover them up.

　　Article 13 Other Responsibilities.

　　If an owner entrusts a manager to lease and manage the property, such owner shall sign a power of attorney with the manager, which shallstipulate responsibilities for environmental protection and other related content.

　　The owner shall ensure and supervise the manager in the performance of his/her duties and obligations regarding environmental protection, and if the manager fails to perform or fails to fully perform the duties and obligations regarding environmental protection, the owner and the manager shall respectively bear their own responsibilities.

　　The owner shall not require or authorize the manager to lease the property to a lessee who does not meet the requirements of environmental protection and shall not require the manager to assist the lessee in engaging in environmental activity violations.

　　Chapter III Supervisory Measures

　　Article 14 Towns (streets) are responsible for the daily inspection of production and business activities of leased property within their jurisdiction; If any environmental violations in the leased property are found, the town representative shall notify the owner and manager in a timely manner and shall advise and urge them to cancel the lease contract according to the law.

　　If owners and managers lease property to others for engagement in environmental activity violations and subsequently environmental pollution or ecological damage has occurred, then the ecological environment, housing, urban-rural construction, and other relevant administrative departments shall, in coordination with public security organs and the town (street), investigate and deal with those transgressions according to the law.

　　Article 15 If collective properties belonging to villager committees and village collective economic organizations are traded through the Guangzhou Public Resources Trading Center or Huadu District Rural Collective Asset Management and Trading Platform, the statement meeting relevant business requirements of environmental protection provisions shall be included in the contract terms. The town (street) and district agricultural and rural bureau shall strengthen the supervision and management of such assets and contracts.

　　If village committees, village collective economic organizations, and market entities construct property in ways such as cooperative development, and such property is leased, the said village committees and village collective economic organizations shall have the responsibility to advise and monitor the market entities to fulfill regulations on environmental protection in accordance with the law. If the market entities are suspected of environmental law violations, village committees, village collective economic organizations and market entities bear their own corresponding responsibility in accordance with the law.

　　Article 16 District government departments and public institutions, district state-owned enterprises, and other organizations with state-owned asset management responsibilities, if leasing state-owned property to others for engagement in production and business activities, shall clarify environmental access conditions in the leasing program and strictly examine whether the lessee meets conditions and requirements for access in terms of environmental protection.

　　Article 17 The Huadu Branch Bureau of the Guangzhou Municipal Ecological Environment Bureau shall develop a model text of environmental protection responsibilities. When filing a leased property, each town (street) shall ensure that the owner, manager, and lessee have signed a statement of environmental protection responsibility. The district housing and urban-rural development bureau shall be responsible for guiding and urging towns (streets) to ensure that the statement of responsibility for environmental protection has been duly signed.

　　Article 18 TheHuadu Branch Bureau of the Guangzhou Municipal Ecological Environment Bureau is responsible for guiding and supervising the environmental information disclosure system for leased properties within its administrative area. For lessees categorized as key emission-making organizations, owners and managers shall advise them to disclose environmental information by way of prescribed channels; lessees other than such organizations can refer to such organizations for disclosure of their environmental information.

　　Article 19 Environmental Credit Management System.

　　The Huadu Branch Bureau of the Guangzhou Municipal Ecological Environment Bureau shall record, in its social integrity archives, the environmental violation information, such as environmental pollution or ecological damage caused by illegal leasing by owners and managers and publicized such information on relevant platforms or media; relevant disciplinary measures shall also be taken in accordance with relevant regulations.

　　Chapter IV Accountability of Environmental Damage

　　Article 20 The responsibility of owners and managers for environmental damage in property leasing activities shall be investigated in accordance with the principle of respectively responsible and accountable. Owners and managers failing to fulfill their own relevant obligations shall be held responsible according to the law.

　　Article 21 For environmental violations of leased property suspected of illegal land use and illegal construction, district planning and natural resources, ecological environment, urban management comprehensive law enforcement, other relevant administrative law enforcement departments, and the local town (street) shall investigate and deal with illegal land use, illegal construction, and environmental violations according to the law.

　　Article 22 If the lease contract of the leased property does not specify the responsibility for environmental protection, the relevant administrative department or town (street) shall give notice for corrections and shall register and file the supplemented and corrected lease contract. If the owner and manager fail to go through the registration and filing procedures for the lease of a leased property as required, or submit false registration and filing documents for the lease of the leased property, the relevant administrative law enforcement departments or towns (streets) shall penalize them according to the law.

　　Article 23 If an owner and manager lease their property to a lessee who does not meet the environmental protection access conditions or fails to go through the environmental protection procedures according to the law, the Huadu Branch Bureau of the Guangzhou Municipal Ecological Environment Bureau shall investigate and deal with the offense according to the law in coordination with relevant administrative law enforcement departments, such as the district housing and urban-rural development bureau, public security organs, and towns (streets).

　　Article 24 If owners and managers have known that the lessees is suspected of committing a crime of environmental pollution, but still provide assistance to the lessee, or help the lessee to escape, or make false certificates for cover-up, the Huadu Branch Bureau of the Guangzhou Municipal Ecological Environment Bureau will transfer the lessee’s suspected criminal evidence to the public security organ for investigating the lessee’s criminal responsibility according to the law.

　　Article 25 When the Huadu Branch Bureau of the Guangzhou Municipal Ecological Environment Bureau and relevant administrative law enforcement departments are investigating and handling leased properties and lessee’s environmental violations, if the owner and manager refuse to fulfill their obligations to provide assistance and cooperation, and, by means of violence and threats, hinder the staff of state organs to perform their official duties in accordance with laws, the public security organs shall investigate their responsibilities in accordance with the law.  

　　Article 26 If the collective property belonging to the villager committee or the village collective economic organization is leased to the lessee, results in environmental pollution or ecological damage, the Huadu Branch Bureau of the Guangzhou Municipal Ecological Environment Bureau, together with the town (street), shall interview the primarily responsible persons, relevant responsible persons, and other responsible persons of the village community. If the circumstances are serious, the Huadu Branch Bureau of the Guangzhou Municipal Ecological Environment Bureau or the town (street) shall submit punitive suggestions to the appointing and removing organ or discipline inspection and supervision organ.

　　Article 27 If the district government departments and public institutions, district state-owned enterprises, and other state-owned assets management organizations lease state-owned property to lessees resulting in environmental pollution or ecological damage, then the Huadu Branch Bureau of the Guangzhou Municipal Ecological Environment Bureau shall interview the primarily responsible persons, relevant responsible persons, and other relevant responsible persons of the organization. If the circumstances are serious, then the Huadu Branch Bureau of the Guangzhou Municipal Ecological Environment Bureau or state-owned asset supervision department shall put forward punitive suggestions to the appointing and removing organ or discipline inspection and supervision organ.

　　Article 28 If owners and managers commit other environmental violations, they shall be investigated and punished by the relevant administrative law enforcement departments in accordance with the law. If they are suspected of committing a crime, their criminal liability shall be investigated and penalized in accordance with the law.

　　Chapter V Compensation for Environmental Damage

　　Article 29 Owners, managers, and lessees shall bear the breach liability for personal injury and personal and collective asset damage caused by pollution of the environment and ecological damage.

　　Article 30 If owners, managers, and lessees violate China’s regulations and thus caused damage to the ecological environment, they shall bear the responsibilities of repair and compensation. For cases falling within the application scope of the Implementation Plan for Reform of Compensation System for Ecological Environmental Damage in Guangzhou, the district government may designate the relevant functional departments to carry out the preliminary work of ecological and environmental damage compensation, such as investigation, damage assessment, and site pollutant cleanup and disposal.

　　Article 31 For those who cause damage to social and public interests and who may act illegally to damage social and public interests, such as damaging the ecological environment and resource protection, the people's procuratorate shall file a public interest lawsuit according to the law.

　　Eligible social organizations are encouraged to carry out a civil public interest lawsuit respective of the ecological environment. If a social organization brings a civil public interest lawsuit to a people's court for acts that have damaged the public interest, such as environmental pollution and ecological damage, legal aid institutions may provide legal aid based on its application.

　　Chapter VI Supplementary Provisions

　　Article 32These measures shall come into force on the date of promulgation and shall remain effective for 3 years.

Form of Disclosure: Active Disclosure

Huadu District People’s Government of Guangzhou     Issued on November 15, 2021