The Environmental Protection Ministry issued a guidance on Thursday making it mandatory for enterprises with high environmental risk to join an environmental liability insurance system.

The ministry, together with the China Insurance Regulatory Commission, introduced the insurance system in 2007 in an attempt to use a market-oriented approach to tackle pollution damage and compensate victims for their losses.

The new guideline is to make petrochemical and heavy metal industries join the system, which until now enterprises have joined on a voluntary basis.