(Source: CGTN)

The Ministry of Environmental Protection says it has sent two teams to investigate three polluted sewage pits left untreated in the middle of farmlands in North China's Hebei Province and Tianjin.

Local authorities were also ordered to intensify the monitoring and soil quality in and around the area. According to authorities in Dacheng County in Hebei Province, two polluted pits were formed as a result of digging and illegal dumping of waste acid since 2013, contaminating water and soil in the area. In Tianjin in 2013, 18 sewage pits were found in the district of Jinghai.

Authorities have cleaned up 17 of them, leaving one 190，000 square-meter pit unfinished. The investigation team has demanded Dacheng's government to finish the clean-up by the end of September, and urged the government of Jinghai District to do the same by the end of July.