Environmental protection a key growth driver: minister

China's Minister of Environmental Protection Chen Jining gives a press conference for the third session of the 12th National People's Congress (NPC), on environmental protection in Beijing, capital of China, March 7, 2015. (Xinhua/Li Ran)

Environmental protection is an important growth driver for China and the demand for investment would be huge in the years to come, Minister of Environmental Protection Chen Jining said in Beijing Saturday. [Special coverage]

Chen said at a press conference on the sidelines of the the National People's Congress annual session that total investment demand for environmental protection in China will be around 8 trillion yuan (1.3 trillion U.S. dollars) to 10 trillion yuan over the next few years.

Such investment provides "good" momentum for economic growth as it has no repeated construction and yields long-term returns, Chen said.

Currently the government funds accounted for 30 to 40 percent of the total input into environmental protection, said Chen, adding that social capital does not have full access to the market.

The ministry will seek to advance price reform to build a mechanism for measuring project returns and further ease market access by means such as public private partnership, the minister said.

Financing services will be improved, and regulation and oversight will be strengthened as well, he said.

The world's most populous country, China has been seeking a "difficult balance" between economic and social development and ecological and environmental protection.

Environmental deterioration is a blight on people's quality of life and a trouble that weighs on their hearts, Premier Li Keqiang said while delivering the annual government work report Thursday.

"We must fight it with all our might," the premier said.