Local governments must squarely face up to the issue of soil pollution and take action to deal with any potential threat to public health, says an article in the 21st Century Business Herald (excerpts below).

Wang Shiyuan, vice-minister of the Ministry of Land and Resources, said in a recent news conference that the second national land survey found about 3.4 million hectares of arable land was seriously contaminated.

This is the first concrete official figure in the sensitive field over which the government had kept silent for too long.

Soil pollution harms human health and the environment and is more difficult to verify and to tackle than air and water pollution.

The reports covering poisonous rice, polluted vegetables and cancer villages are reminders of the gravity of soil contamination.

Treating soil pollution is a complicated and time-consuming process, which should be based on accurate data obtained from surveys and investigations.

The database on soil pollution should be transparent to the public, as people have been kept in the dark about the serious health threat for too long.

The environmental authority needs to take action to prevent new land from being polluted while treating contaminated land.