The State Council, China's cabinet, on Wednesday issued a timetable for its program to upgrade fuel quality, with strict standards to be promoted nationwide before 2017.

The country will issue the "5th-phase" standard for automobile petrol, with sulphur content within 10 parts per million, before the end of the year, with a grace period until the end of 2017, according to an executive meeting of the State Council chaired by Premier Wen Jiabao.

Beijing is the only city in China to have adopted such a standard, equal to Europe's Euro V vehicle emissions cap of sulphur content below 10 ppm.