Environmental Policies in China - Research Paper Example

? Environmental Policies in China Table of Contents I. Introduction 3 II. Environmental Policies in China 5 Works Cited 10 I. Introduction This paperexplores the environmental policies in China, and posits that given the large and global scale of the environmental impacts of its economic activities, China needs to shape up and take a hard look at its environmental policies, with an eye towards mitigating the harsh impacts of its economic activities on the environment and reevaluating its long-term policies to make them more sustainable and environment-friendly (Central Intelligence Agency; Biello; The Economist Newspaper Limited; TV Novosti). There was a period in China's history prior to the 19th century when China ruled the world in the ways that the United States does now, economically and politically, and the early part of the 20th century was particularly harsh for many Chinese, what with the takeover of government by Communist forces led by Mao Zedong, which started a rule that was characterized by an iron fist and very tight regulations with restricted freedoms. On the other hand, the rule of Mao was succeeded by a period of first even more massive suffering but also later the unprecedented turnaround in the economy with a formerly agricultural and inward-looking country economy reversing its trajectory and coming to grow into four times what it was during the time of Mao to what it ended up becoming by the turn of the new millennium. Living standards skyrocketed, and China's economic boom resulted in the creation of a large middle class who consumed products that were in line with the rapidly rising incomes of the new rich: cars and the other symbols of wealth. This in turn has led to problems with the environment, as the economic growth spurred the consumption of oil and coal to power industries that manufactured goods for the rest of the world and to power domestic consumption as well. Other manufacturing-related processes also bred other forms of toxins to the environment as well as razed some vital ecologies into the ground in the name of progress and consumption as well. A telling set of statistics on the role that China plays in the global ecology versus economic equation is that it leads the world both in the production and consumption of energy, and that out of its total energy requirements,two-thirds are supplied by fossil fuels, with a substantial portion likewise supplied by nuclear power plants. These two power sources have implications for the state of the world ecology and for the sustainability of energy generation policies relative to the environment (Central Intelligence Agency). Taking a step back, the prominent role of China in the world economy and in the way their activities impact the environment have not gone unnoticed and have attracted the intense scrutiny of those who are natural stakeholders in the state of the world ecology and the environment, and that this intense scrutiny has provided a growing body of literature on the environmental policies of China. From the state of the nation's soils and water supplies, to the examination of how China's environmental policies have attracted investments in their laxness, to aspects of policy relating to the environment versus the rise of cities, it is clear from the academic research that the concern over the environment in China is intense and far-reaching (Wei and Yang; Dean, Lovely and Wang; Vennemo et al.. Hubacek et al.). The consensus, even inside China and among China's ruling elite, is that current environmental policies and economic activities are harming China's future and are jeopardizing prospects for a sustainable future for the country, with the state of the environment characterized by rising levels of pollution that have implications for larger realities like climate change and the very viability of the way of life of the Chinese, and the long-term health prospects of its citizens (Volcovici, Grumbine; Friedman; Phillips; Duggan; Biello; The Economist Newspaper Limited; TV Novosti). II. Environmental Policies in China One view is that China's environmental problems, especially as they relate to the problems reining in air pollution from economic activities that require the use of fossil fuels to power production and related industries, is severe. This is particularly true with regard to emissions of carbon dioxide from human activities, which have large implications for global warming, and the levels of sulfur in the air are also a cause for concern, among others (Vennemo et al.). Other indicators of damage to the overall Chinese ecology, and the lack of effective environmental policies to stem the damage, have been culled from scientific studies on the levels of heavy metals in urban and rural settlements, with implications for public health (Wei and Yang). Some of the concerns, meanwhile, with the correlation between the lax environmental policies in China and new investments into the country by players who see China as a haven for pollution have been validated, and call for action in terms of strengthening environmental policies to correct these (Dean, Lovely and Wang). Not only industries oriented for export and are energy-intensive, but those aspects of China's environmental policies dealing with urbanization and the lifestyles that cities have come to engender, including implicitly the increased use of vehicles that consume fossil fuels and emit pollutants into the environment, are also being called into scrutiny, with concerns over the footprint to the ecology and the damage to the ecology of massive undertakings related to urbanization. The take is that these policies aimed at spurring growth may lie at the heart of China's environmental problems as well (Hubacek et al.). Aspects of the state of China's environment and the correlation between China's environmental policies are coming into focus with the more intense scrutiny being generated by concerns over the state of the global climate and over the sustainability of the economic activities of the world's largest economies and the picture that has emerged has not been very good for China. For one, according to data, China is now the largest air polluter in the world, accounting for the highest share of global emission in carbon dioxide in the world. In the long term the climate and other nations suffer too from the effects of climate change, but in the short term the impact on air quality and on the health of the Chinese are also tremendous and needs to be addressed. These can be construed as massive signs of the collapse or ineffectiveness of Chinese policies for the environment, and are said to indicate a heavy preference for economic growth with little counter-regard for the impact of the economic growth on the ecology and the health and well-being of the citizens and the environment as a whole (Central Intelligence Agency; Volcovici). There is the identified need too, for the outside world to treat China in terms of the scale of its pollution contributions and take the country to task in those terms, by way of encouraging China to intently re-examine its environmental policies and their environmental commitments in forums such as those that are tackling climate change and are pressuring countries, including China, to commit to environmental targets on air pollution and other related targets (Jolly and Buckley) Elsewhere, the failure of the environmental policies in China are said to be reflected not just in the bad quality and further deteriorating quality of the air in the country, which is getting much of the attention, but also the deteriorating quality of the water in the country, which is said to be characterized by heavy contamination of vital bodies of water all over the country, threatening vital water supplies. In 2011, for instance, statistics coming out of the government itself reveal that up to 50 percent of the country's biggest water reservoirs and lakes have reached levels of contamination that have made those bodies of water unfit for consumption by people. 60 percent of all supplies of water meanwhile have been deemed badly polluted. The blame has been put on the relaxed policies relating to the environment by the Chinese, which have sacrificed environmental issues in favor of the economy. Such tradeoff is now being seen as being too big to ignore, given the sustained damage to the ecology and the long-term negative impact to the lives of the Chinese (Ma and Adams). The problem is being recognized in the highest circles of government power, but one analysis points out that inertia going in the direction of sacrificing the environment for economic progress is large and of long standing, and this inertia is reflected in the slow pace of reforms within China and the resistance of leadership at various levels to change older orientations and to put the environment on top of other agenda (Friedman). Elsewhere the analysis reveals that while government at the very top has come to understand the gravity of the problem and the ineffectiveness and shortsightedness of its relaxed environmental policies in the past, and have come to put the environment as priority in its agenda for long-term planning, this same inertia has consequences that seem intractable and out of the hands of the government to control even with the use of massive financial resources and the powerful bureaucratic and economic machinery at the disposal of the government at various levels. The air and water pollution and contamination have reached levels that are not easily tamed, and have come to be bred partly by forces that are beyond the ability of government to successfully control, such as those relating to the rise of the cities which contribute further to the environmental woes of the country. The short of it is that the ecological problems that grew from the efforts of the past thirty years to stimulate growth in the economy have environmental impacts that may need that much time again, or more, to tame. Meanwhile, it is clear too from the deterioration of living conditions in China due to damage to water supplies and to the air quality that the problems need to be addressed now rather than later, when it might be too late to do anything about the degradation. Children for instance, according to an analysis, cannot wait thirty years before they have clean water to drink. These are all happening, moreover, even as the government seems to be halfhearted to institute meaningful reforms to environmental policies even at this late stage and even with the problems escalating by the day (Grumbine). The reality of the environmental policy changes taking time to take root in their effects, even as the environment continues on its downward spiral, with dire consequences to entire populations, is said to be now staring China in the face. This reality too, it is reported, is reflected in a larger scale, as the impact of damage to the environment of large-scale pollution is expected to be felt for years to come, in the form of severe disturbances to the weather that may have cataclysmic impacts to large populations everywhere. The take is that even if China doubles down on efforts to reform ineffective environmental policies and spends large amounts of money, the forces that damage the ecology have been set loose and have come to have a life and a momentum of its own. This momentum is self-propelling at this point, while the damage to the environment is exponential in scope as well, and so are the consequences to the Chinese and the rest of the world. The data corroborate the way, for instance, that water issues are tied to the way China mismanaged its power development strategies, using coal plants, which consume large amounts of water, to power industries that themselves use large water resources and contribute further to the massive amounts of air pollution coming out of those plants. The momentum being referred to here is that even as China recognizes the gravity of its environmental problems, economic concerns dictate that China may need to further invest in coal plants and to further escalate its pollution emissions. This dynamic is just an example of the larger dynamic of the forward momentum of the problems bred by decades of poor environmental policies and planning that no short term fixes will be able to address (Phillips; Duggan; Biello; The Economist Newspaper Limited). Works Cited Biello, David. “What Do China's New Policies Mean for the Environment?” Scientific American. 22 November 2013. Web. 5 December 2013. Central Intelligence Agency. “China”. World Factbook. 2013. Web. 5 December 2013. Dean, Judith, Mary Lovely and Hua Wang. “Are foreign investors attracted to weak environmental regulations? Evaluating the evidence from China”. Journal of Development Economics 90. 2009. Web. 5 December 2013. Duggan, Jennifer. “How China's action on air pollution is slowing its carbon emissions”. The Guardian. 2013. Web. 5 December 2013. Friedman, Thomas. “Too Big to Breathe?” The New York Times Opinion Pages. 5 November 2013. Web. 5 December 2013. Grumbine, R. Edward. “China at a Crossroads: Balancing Economy and Environment”. Environment 360. 14 November 2013. Web. 5 December 2013. Hubacek, Klaus et al. “Environmental implications of urbanization and lifestyle change in China: Ecological and Water Footprints”. Journal of Cleaner Production 17. 2009. Web. 5 December 2013. Jolly, David and Buckley, Chris. “US and China Find Convergence on Climate Issue”. The New York Times. 21 November 2013. Web. 5 December 2013. Ma, Damien and Adams, William. “If You Think China's Air is Bad...”. The New York Times. 7 November 2013. Web. 5 December 2013. Phillips, Ari. “Inside China's Desperate Effort to Control Pollution- Before It's Too Late. Climate Progress. 26 November 2013. Web. 5 December 2013. The Economist Newspaper Limited. “China and the Environment: The East is Grey”. The Economist. 10 August 2013. Web. 5 December 2013. TV Novosti. “Smog-choked China shifts gears in effort to reverse environmental damage”. RT. 18 November 2013. Web. 5 December 2013. Vennemo, Haekon et al. “Environmental Pollution in China: Status and Trends”. Review of Environmental Economics and Policies (2009). 23 June 2009. Web. 5 December 2013. Wei, Binggan and Yang, Linsheng. “A review of heavy metal contamination in urban soils, urban road dusts and agricultural soils in China”. Microchemical Journal 94. 2010. Web. 5 December 2013. Read More