BEIJING -- Over 38 billion tons of waste water flowed into China's three major rivers, the Yangtze, Yellow and Huaihe rivers in 2005, according to a series of recently released reports on the country's water resources.

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The Yangtze River, the country's longest, had 29.6 billion tons of waste water dumped in it last year, including 20.4 billion tons of industrial waste water, according to a report released by the Yangtze River Water Resources Commission.

More than 4.35 billion tons of waste water were dumped into the Yellow River, China's second longest, last year, an increase over the previous year, according to the Yellow River Water Resources Commission.

The Huaihe River, another major river in east China, was polluted by 4.5 billion tons of waste water last year.

According to the State Environmental Protection Administration, China's overall pollution discharge continued to rise in the first three quarters of this year. It pointed out that the major cause was indiscriminate dumping in order to lower costs and protect profits.

The central and local governments have invested hundreds of millions of U.S. dollars a year to build waste water treatment plants and other facilities to curb worsening water pollution situation.

In October, China's State Council founded a "pollution source census panel", headed by Vice-Premier Zeng Peiyan, to carry out a nationwide pollution source inventory over the next few years.

Detailed plans are still under discussion but this census -- which aims to "provide the data needed to achieve the eleventh five-year plan (2006-2010) goal of reduce China's main pollutants by ten percent" -- will be a first for China.