Procuratorates across China handled 506,634 public interest litigation cases from July 1, 2017 to August 2021, the Supreme People's Procuratorate (SPP) said Wednesday.

Statistics by the SPP showed that among these cases, 37,673 were civil lawsuits, and 468,961 administrative cases.

To maximize public interests, procuratorates made 408,997 suggestions to government departments to push them to fulfil duties before filing a public interest lawsuit against them, and 98.53 percent of these suggestions were responded to and followed, said the SPP.

China began to institute public interest litigation on July 1, 2017 after the country's top legislature incorporated the practice into the law by passing amendments to the civil and administrative procedure laws in June that year.