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  PlanetSave 15 Feb 06
China announces plan to combat pollution, revive battered environment
Written by Elaine Kurtenbach

SHANGHAI, China (AP) _ China announced a plan Wednesday to combat widespread pollution and leave a better environment for future generations. The plan, approved by the State Council, or Cabinet, focuses on pollution controls and calls for the country to clean up heavily polluted regions and reverse degradation of water, air and land by 2010.

"The move is aimed at protecting the long-term interests of the Chinese nation and leaving a good living and development space for our offspring," according to an announcement published in state media on Wednesday.

The government has previously responded to environmental crises largely on a piecemeal basis. The plan announced Wednesday appears to be a broader strategy in keeping with the government's newly stated emphasis on seeking sustainable development after years of breakneck growth.

"The government does seem to be paying more attention to broad environmental protection issues," said Zhao Qingxiang, a professor at the Environment Department of Shanghai's East China University of Science & Technology.

"But what I'm concerned about is how this plan will affect the entire ecological system, which has a long way to go," Zhao said. "It's not just a matter of closing down a few factories."

Giving teeth to the move, the plan calls for environmental quality to be considered in assessing the performance of local officials--until recently judged mainly on their success in promoting economic development. Regional governments will be asked to set environmental targets and conduct regular evaluations, the announcement said.

"Leading officials and other relevant government officials will be punished for making wrong decisions that cause serious environmental accidents and for gravely obstructing environmental law enforcement," it said.

Government ministries have been ordered to adapt fiscal, tax, pricing, trade and technology policies to the new strategy, the announcement said. The State Council said the plan was in part prompted by a toxic chemical spill along northeastern China's Songhua River in November that "stunned the nation and sounded an alarm about the country's worsening environment."

The environmental protection minister was dismissed following the disaster, which affected water supplies for millions of people living in both China and neighboring Russia.

Pollution, often linked to official corruption and incompetence, has also sparked a series of sometimes violent confrontations between authorities and rural residents. In one of the more widely publicized cases, dozens were injured in riots in April when police tried to move protesters from an industrial complex in Wangkantou, a village in eastern China's Zhejiang province. The residents were outraged over chemical plant pollution they said had destroyed their crops.

"The issue of pollution has become a 'blasting fuse' for social instability," Zhou Shengxian, director of the State Environmental Protection Administration, told the official Xinhua News Agency.

Among the most urgent problems cited by the its report were acid rain, which has damaged more than one-third of China's land area; pollution of the soil; organic pollutants; potential risks from nuclear facilities and a decline in biodiversity, the Xinhua report noted.

Evidence of the negative effects of years of rapid industrialization, uncontrolled construction and widespread use of farm chemicals can be seen everywhere in China, from the biggest cities to the deep countryside.

Canals surrounding Shanghai stink and fester--the same for many in the countryside. Huge stretches of rural land are piled with used construction materials and other waste. Some 16 of the world's 20 smoggiest cities are in China, with deaths from air pollution estimated at over 400,000 a year.

Local authorities have tended not to enforce pollution controls, land use restrictions and other limits that might hurt land sales and tax revenues or discourage investors. Heavily polluting factories often either bribe officials to look the other way or pay cursory fines.

The plan calls for China's cities to ensure at least 70 percent of sewage is treated by 2010--in most urban areas the rate is still below 50 percent. It sets a 60 percent minimum for proper handling of household waste.

In much of China, sewage and industrial effluent runs straight into rivers and lakes: the government recently reported that more than 300 million rural dwellers lack access to clean drinking water. "The most urgent task for us is to check water pollution to ensure the safety of drinking water, and we must win the battle," Zhou said.

PlanetArk 16 Feb 06
China Issues Guidelines to Tackle Pollution
Story by Lindsay Beck

BEIJING - China published a wide-ranging plan to tackle environmental degradation on Wednesday, addressing an issue that has become a threat to the country's breakneck economic growth, its social stability and its citizens' health.

Chinese officials frequently pledge tighter regulations and tougher punishments to try to curb pollution, but analysts were hopeful that the document issued by the State Council, or cabinet, would carry more weight.

"This carries all the things that SEPA wants to do but could not do, either because of institutional conflicts with other ministries or things they couldn't push through as quickly through legislation," said Zhang Jianyu, China manager of the US-based organisation Environmental Defense. SEPA is the State Environmental Protection Administration, China's top environmental body.

Cities throughout China are choked with car exhaust and factory pollution and many of its rivers are poisoned, but the drive to clean up the environment has been getting more attention since an explosion at a chemical plant last November poisoned drinking water for millions.

The blast in northeastern Jilin poured cancer-causing benzene compounds into the Songhua River, caused water supplies for millions to be cut off and sent a toxic slick toward the Russian border, turning the spill into an international incident.

The State Council regulations focus on water, air and soil pollution and set targets to improve the environment in heavily polluted cities and regions by 2010 and across the country by 2020.

They also aim to take environmental factors into account when evaluating local officials, who have been accused of stonewalling environmental initiatives in an effort to instead focus on economic growth.

"Leading officials and other relevant government officials will be punished for making wrong decisions that cause serious environmental accidents and for gravely obstructing environmental law enforcement," said the regulations, which were printed in domestic media.

SEPA's head was forced to resign following the Songhua spill. Its new chief, Zhou Shengxian, acknowledged that environmental problems have also become a trigger for social unrest.

"The issue of pollution has become a 'blasting fuse' of social instability," Zhou said in comments carried by the official Xinhua news agency. Last year there were at least three riots in the eastern province of Zhejiang alone that were serious enough to force the closure of polluting chemical and battery factories.

Despite signs the government is beginning to take environmental degradation more seriously - it named 11 companies for serious pollution earlier this month - the regulations warned there were more problems to come. "In the next 15 years, the fight against pollution will become ever more arduous as the nation's economy is expected to quadruple," the document said.
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