Most multinationals that breached China's environmental rules have corrected their failings, said a spokesman for the country's environment watchdog yesterday.

The State Environmental Protection Administration found in an nationwide inspection that none of the 130 multinationals with a history of breaching environmental regulations in the past four years had continued with their violations, said SEPA spokesman Tao Detian.

But SEPA did discover that three of them had violated new rules.

It found CG-Omnova Decorative Products (Shanghai) Co Ltd and Jinmailang Corporation in Chengdu had discharged an excessive amount of pollutants and another Shanghai-based company, Shanghai COSCO Kawasaki Heavy Industries Steel Structure Co Ltd, were guilty of noise pollution.

Multinational companies have to shoulder the same environmental responsibilities as domestic ones, said Tao, who also called on the companies to step up the building of inner mechanisms on environmental management.

Ninety multinational companies were put on a list of industrial polluters published in August 2007, by the Institute of Public and Environmental Affairs, a Beijing-based Chinese non-government organization.

Among them were international big names such as Pepsi, 3M, Nescafe, Yamaha and Samsung, as well as KFC and Pizza Hut.

Half are in Shanghai.

(Xinhua News Agency January 10, 2008)