BEIJING -- The central government has earmarked some 2.8 billion yuan ($451 million) to help 30 cities tackle heavy metal pollution for the next three years, according to the Ministry of Environmental Protection.

The beneficiaries, 11 of which are in central China's Hunan Province, were selected based on applications by governments of polluted areas, a more competitive approach than the routine mode wherein local areas wait passively for central authorities' financial push.

Funding criteria set by the ministries of finance and environmental protection included polluted conditions, feasibility of prevention and control projects, anti-pollution infrastructure resources, among others.

Financial support for cities with unsatisfactory pollution control results in 2014 will be reduced, the ministry said.

Officially, 16 percent of China's soil and nearly 20 percent of farmland is polluted, but this may just be the tip of the iceberg.

Last year, police arrested 23 staff at a company that poured 300,000 tonnes of toxic sludge from a leather works into a waterway in east China's Zhejiang Province.

Central and local governments spent 41.6 billion yuan between 2012 and 2014 on heavy metal pollution, and the emission of pollutants was "greatly reduced," the environmental ministry said in Sept. last year.

Finance and environmental protection departments at the province level were asked to spell out specific goals, timetables and the liabilities of those involved.