Zhou Shengxian (; born December 1949) is a retired Chinese politician who served as the inaugural Minister of Environmental Protection.

Biography

Zhou was born in Wuzhong,

Ningxia Hui Autonomous Region Ningxia (,; , ; alternately romanized as Ninghsia), officially the Ningxia Hui Autonomous Region (NHAR), is an autonomous region in the northwest of the People's Republic of China. Formerly a province, Ningxia was incorporated into Gansu in ...

. He joined the

Chinese Communist Party The Chinese Communist Party (CCP), officially the Communist Party of China (CPC), is the founding and sole ruling party of the People's Republic of China (PRC). Under the leadership of Mao Zedong, the CCP emerged victorious in the Chinese Ci ...

in 1972, and is a senior economist. He began his career as a middle school teacher. Eventually he rose to become Secretary-General of the Ningxia Autonomous Regional government, then Vice-Chairman of Ningxia, then he became deputy director of the State Forestry Administration. He became Minister of Environmental Protection in 2008, after the ministry was reformed from the Environment Protection Bureau. The ministry was given more powers than the Bureau. He left office as environmental protection minister in 2015 due to having reached the mandatory retirement age of 65 for minister-level officials. Since then he has become a member of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference, and sits on the Committee of Population, Resources and Environment. Zhou was an alternate member of the

16th Central Committee of the Chinese Communist Party The 16th Central Committee of the Chinese Communist Party was in session from 2002 to 2007. It held seven plenary sessions. It was set in motion by the 16th National Congress of the Chinese Communist Party. The 15th Central Committee preceded it. ...

, and a full member of the

17th 17 (seventeen) is the natural number following 16 and preceding 18. It is a prime number. Seventeen is the sum of the first four prime numbers. In mathematics 17 is the seventh prime number, which makes seventeen the fourth super-prime, as s ...

and 18th Central Committees.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Zhou, Shengxian People's Republic of China politicians from Ningxia 1949 births Living people Chinese Communist Party politicians from Ningxia People from Wuzhong Ministers of Environmental Protection of the People's Republic of China