It was learned from the “general plan for the ecological environmental protection of lakes with sound water quality (2013-2020”(“general plan”for short) issued by National Development and Reform Commission, Ministry of Environmental Protection and Ministry of Finance that some protection work would be carried out for 365 lakes with sound water quality, including Dongjiang lake.

In order to protect lakes ecological environment and not to follow the way of “pollution first, and then treatment”, a method of partition protection was listed on the “general plan”. According to the method, the lakes with sound water quality would be divided into 5 natural distribution areas. Dongjiang lake was covered into the eastern lakes area. The 160 square kilometers big Dongjiang lake is with normal water storage capacity of 8.12billion cubic meters, and its water quality is superior to II grade national standard of drinking water. It is the indispensable ecological water supplement of Xiangjiang river and plays the comprehensive functions of flood control of the cities along Xiangjiang river, electricity generation, and protection of biological diversity.

In current years, along with the great efforts tried by Zixing city and the supports provided by Hunan province and Chenzhou city, Dongjiang lake has been enrolled into national key ecological environmental protection lakes list, national scenic areas list, national ecological tourism demonstration zones list, national wetland part pilots list and has been listed as one of the five pilots of key basin and water resources ecological compensation. According to the protection targets specified on the “general plan”, Dongjiang lake’s water quality should be better than II class in 2015 and should be even better till 2020 which would help to enhance Hunan provincial strategic water resource status. At the meantime, some solutions, protection measures for the protection work were figured on the “general plan”. The evaluation for the targets set for the protection of lakes covered into the “general plan” would be followed with“interim measures for the assessment of implementation of special plan of the governance of key basins’ water pollution” .