China released its regional rankings for green development index on Tuesday, the first time that the country has evaluated local performance based on environment indicators rather than merely the speed of GDP growth.

Beijing tops the overall green development rankings, followed by Fujian, Zhejiang and Shanghai, according to results released by the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS).

China has made more efforts to improve its ecological system since 2013 and at the 19th National Congress of the CPC in October, the leadership further called for attaching importance to the coordinated development of economic, social and environmental development and urged to improve the country's economic and social development assessment system, said Ning Jizhe, deputy head of the National Development and Reform Commission. "Ecological civilization construction is a long-term, tough systemic project and annual appraisal (of green development) will be a regular work in the future," said Ning, who is also head of the NBS.

The index covers seven major sub-indexes: resource utilization, environmental management, environmental quality, ecological protection, growth quality, green life, and public satisfaction. Indicators such as total energy consumption, carbon emissions per unit of gross domestic product and total water consumption will all be assessed.

"The index can reflect the overall development of ecological system in China's provinces and regions," said Li Xiaoxi, an economist of Beijing Normal University. "It is a powerful measure for China to accomplish its green development strategy and provides a precious basis for officials at all levels, especially provincial-level officials, to implement green development strategy and the 13th Five-Year Plan (2016-20)."