However, in 2011 the Ministry for Environmental Protection (MEP) undertook a trial to assess air, soil and water quality in a sample of 364 villages. This is consistent with recent studies showing significant pollution spillovers from cities into surrounding areas and high levels of pollution coming from rural areas themselves (Cao et al., Likewise, rivers can transport pollution over large distances such that populations living in areas without high concentrations of heavily polluting industries may be exposed to upstream activities as well as environmental accidents which continue to pose a serious threat (He et al.,