The central ecological and environmental protection inspection campaign has played a key role in addressing some critical and deeply-rooted environmental problems in China, Zhai Qing, vice-minister of the Ministry of Ecology and Environment, said on Friday.

The campaign, promoted and spearheaded by the central leadership, was piloted in late 2015 and has since been carried out across 31 provincial-level regions in China, as well as some government departments and State-owned enterprises, he said on the sidelines of the 20th National Congress of the Communist Party of China.

The first round of the inspection had completed 96 percent of its nearly 3,300 pre-designated tasks. The initial phase of the second round, which is ongoing, has identified about 1,230 rectification tasks and 60 percent of them have been finished.

So far, inspection teams have handled 287,000 complaints on environmental problems from the public during the campaign, and 286,000 of them have been settled or partially solved.

He said authorities will plan a third round of inspection and continue to stress rigorous implementation in their work.