China Watch
A joint initiative of the Worldwatch Institute and Beijing-based Global Environmental Institute (GEI), China Watch reports on energy, agriculture, population, water, health, and the environment in China—with an emphasis on big-picture analysis relevant to policy makers, the business community, and non-governmental organizations. View a profile of the Global Environmental Institute.
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 State of the World 2006
Special Focus: China and India
"Top-ranked annual book on sustainable development."
—GlobeScan survey of sustainability experts
About China Watch
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News Updates
by Ling Li on September 25, 2007 At a Green China Forum meeting earlier this month, Pan Yue, the vice president of China’s State Environmental Protection Administration (SEPA), made an unequivocal statement about the need to address the nation’s mounting environmental challenges.
by Ling Li on September 13, 2007 China’s Ministry of Science and Technology (MOST) has launched a new energy conservation guide for citizens in an effort to promote the twin goals of saving energy and reducing emissions.
by Ling Li on August 30, 2007 Starting next month, China’s State Electricity Regulatory Commission (SERC) will assume nationwide oversight over power companies that are required under the country’s renewable energy law to prioritize purchases of the maximum amount of ‘green’ electricity available in their coverage areas, according to a recent regulation released by SERC.
by Ling Li on August 23, 2007 Early last month, China’s top environmental authority, the State Environmental Protection Administration (SEPA), announced a decision to suspend the approval of all new industrial projects in 13 cities and industrial parks along four major rivers that are suffering from severe water pollution—the Hai, Huai, Yangtze, and Yellow.
by Monica Liau on August 9, 2007 Chinese authorities say global warming is to blame for the extreme weather conditions that have afflicted the country this year, Reuters reports.
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Analysis
by Yingling Liu on January 15, 2008 The
State Council, China’s cabinet, recently issued a directive banning the
production of ultra-thin plastic bags. The ruling
also prohibits shops, supermarkets, and sales outlets nationwide from handing
out free plastic bags starting on June 1.
by Yingling Liu on December 6, 2007 In the past several months, fuel scarcity has once again swept over much
of China:
drivers queuing for hours outside filling stations only to get a few liters of
rationed fuel, or simply being turned away by dry nozzles.
by Yingling Liu on November 29, 2007 In her essay, “The
Great Leap Backward?” ( Foreign
Affairs, September/October 2007), author Elisabeth Economy offers valuable
insights into the unprecedented scale of environmental problems China now faces.
by Yingling Liu on November 8, 2007 The waters off China’s
eastern and northeastern coasts, home to the country’s major seafood production
and fish farms, have become a giant dumping ground for chemical wastes.
by Yongfeng Feng on November 1, 2007 Every city needs someone to take care of its garbage. The most resource-efficient
way to dispose of urban trash is to recycle and reuse it. But this is more difficult than it sounds, especially in Beijing.
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News Updates
by Ling Li on September 25, 2007 At a Green China Forum meeting earlier this month, Pan Yue, the vice president of China’s State Environmental Protection Administration (SEPA), made an unequivocal statement about the need to address the nation’s mounting environmental challenges.
by Ling Li on September 13, 2007 China’s Ministry of Science and Technology (MOST) has launched a new energy conservation guide for citizens in an effort to promote the twin goals of saving energy and reducing emissions.
by Ling Li on August 30, 2007 Starting next month, China’s State Electricity Regulatory Commission (SERC) will assume nationwide oversight over power companies that are required under the country’s renewable energy law to prioritize purchases of the maximum amount of ‘green’ electricity available in their coverage areas, according to a recent regulation released by SERC.
by Monica Liau on August 9, 2007 Chinese authorities say global warming is to blame for the extreme weather conditions that have afflicted the country this year, Reuters reports.
by Ling Li on July 31, 2007 The release of a landmark 2005 Green National Accounting study that calculates the environmental costs of China’s rapid economic development has been “postponed indefinitely,” according to Wang Jinnan, the head of the study group.
by Monica Liau on July 11, 2007 Under pressure from Beijing government ministries, the World Bank has cut by roughly one third a new report chronicling the widespread cost of pollution in China, according to the Financial Times
by Jianqiang Liu on July 10, 2007 The Chinese government has stepped up efforts to tackle the severe pollution of the nation’s rivers.
by Ling Li on June 7, 2007 China unveiled its first national plan on climate change this Monday, after two years of preparation by the State Council, the National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC), and 17 other departments.
by Qiang Wang et al. on May 31, 2007 A construction crane several tens of meters high is operating furiously at a building site in a large valley of the Dadu River, one of the major tributaries of the Yangtze River.
by Ling Li on May 8, 2007 The Chinese government is encouraging new buildings and major users of heated water—such as hospitals, schools, restaurants, and swimming pools—to install water heaters powered by solar energy, according to a recent plan to promote nationwide use of the systems.
by Jianqiang Liu on April 19, 2007 Buildings account for nearly 30 percent of China’s energy use and are responsible for about a quarter of the nation’s greenhouse gas emissions, according to the latest assessment on China’s energy development.
by Ling Li on March 29, 2007 Northern China’s Shanxi Province, the country’s leading coal producer, has launched a pioneering fund to support more sustainable mining practices in the region. The money will be spent on tackling the environment degradation caused by local coal mining, on developing alternative industries in mining communities, and on improving mine safety...
by Ling Li on March 22, 2007 A recent European Union (EU) decision to phase out the use of incandescent light bulbs in its 27 member nations by 2009 has brought cheer to Chinese lighting manufacturers, who produce nearly 80 percent of the world’s supply of compact fluorescent lamps (CFLs), a more energy-efficient alternative.
by Jianqiang Liu on March 15, 2007 A road between China’s western Yunnan Province and neighboring Burma will be re-opened to traffic following repairs over the next few months. It is part of the 1,600-kilometer Stilwell Road that linked China with India during World War II and is considered key to the development of a new “energy route” between the two countries.
by Ling Li on March 8, 2007 At the opening of the National People’s Congress on Monday, the Chinese government vowed to stick to its goal of reducing energy consumption per unit of gross domestic product (GDP) by 20 percent by 2010, despite failing to meet last year’s annual target.
by Feng Yun on February 22, 2007 The Chinese government has prepared an official national plan to improve the country’s ability to respond to climate change, according to the National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC), China’s top economic planning body.
by Ling Li on February 15, 2007 Early this month, the Chinese government and the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) launched a joint carbon finance project that would use carbon trades in China’s less-developed regions to help reach the UN Millennium Development Goals, including poverty alleviation and environmental sustainability.
by Ling Li on January 25, 2007 As the world’s largest construction market, China is home to half of the new buildings built around the globe each year, adding approximately 2 billion square meters of floor space annually.
by Ling Li on January 11, 2007 At the close of 2006, the warmest year in China since 1951, the Ministry of Science and Technology, the China Meteorological Administration, and the Chinese Academy of Science released the country’s first-ever National Assessment Report on Climate Change.
by Xiaohua Sun on December 27, 2006 China’s current wind power pricing mechanism, based on a public bidding scheme, needs to be changed to a feed-in-tariff system, experts at Beijing conference on wind power pricing concluded earlier this month. They believe this will help protect investors’ enthusiasm and profit in developing renewable energy.
by Ling Li on December 12, 2006 In November, the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), in cooperation with China’s Ministry of Science and Technology (MOST) and the China International Center for Economic and Technical Exchanges under the Ministry of Commerce, initiated a four-year project on “Green Poverty Reduction in China.”
by Hua Zhang on November 23, 2006 China has slid down the annual Climate Change Performance Index (CCPI), a measure of a country’s climate protection efforts, due to its rising emissions of carbon dioxide (CO2). China ranked 29th out of 53 countries in 2006 but...
by Ling Li on October 26, 2006 The Hurun Report, a luxury business magazine known for its annual surveys of China’s wealthiest citizens, recently released its 2006 China Energy Rich List, which ranks the wealth generated from the nation’s booming energy sector.
by Yingling Liu on October 5, 2006 Power authorities recently renovated the 249 lamps lining Beijing’s famous Tian’anmen Square and adjacent Chang’an Street, replacing incandescent and mercury bulbs with energy-efficient electrode-less discharge ones.
by Yingling Liu on September 21, 2006 China’s first heating and cooling system to use seawater pumps is under construction in the northeast coastal city of Dalian and will begin operation this winter.
by Yingling Liu on September 7, 2006 Over the next decade, China plans to invest 800 million RMB (US $100 million) in the development of methane gas hydrate—so-called “combustible ice”—to meet its rising energy demand and alleviate heavy dependence on fossil fuels.
by Zijun Li on August 17, 2006 In the first half of 2006, China’s energy intensity (the amount of energy required for every dollar produced in the economy) climbed 0.8 percent above the corresponding period last year.
by Yingling Liu on August 10, 2006 China’s solar giant Suntech Power Co. Ltd. announced on August 2 that it was acquiring the Japanese photovoltaic (PV) company MSK.
by Yingling Liu on July 13, 2006 A subsidiary of China National Cereals, Oils & Foodstuffs Corporation recently reached a deal with the government of southern Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region to construct a 200,000-ton cassava ethanol plant in the capital Nanning.
by Zijun Li on July 4, 2006 Chinese developers unveiled the world’s first full-permanent magnetic levitation (Maglev) wind power generator at the Wind Power Asia Exhibition 2006 held June 28 in Beijing.
by Yingling Liu on June 22, 2006 China’s Meteorological Administration set up a center on June 14 to assess the country’s vast wind and solar energy resources through advanced methods. This will be of particular benefit to China’s robust wind power industry, providing developers with more accurate and integrated data.
by Zijun Li on June 15, 2006 At a Beijing conference last week, several leading solar energy companies projected that the global shortage in silicon, the material used in most of the world’s solar cells, will ease by 2008 as production capacity expands.
by Yingling Liu on June 13, 2006 China’s government will enact new fiscal policies to encourage the development of biomass energy, according to a CCTV report. Biomass energy is energy derived from plant matter such as trees, agricultural crops, and a range of organic wastes and residues.
by Zijun Li on June 6, 2006 With the arrival of the 2006 flood season, high waters have begun threatening low-lying areas in southern China. Meanwhile, the country’s north continues to suffer from a severe drought. This “northern drought, southern flood” pattern has become a recurring climatic trend in China, and has already affected tens of millions of people nationwide this year.
by Zijun Li on May 23, 2006 As of late April, northern China had encountered eight severe sandstorms this year alone, worsening the air quality in half the region’s cities.
by Yingling Liu on April 27, 2006 China will replace its use of grain as the main feedstock for ethanol production with more economical plant material, an official with the National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC), China’s top policy planner, said at an April 19 seminar in Shanghai on bioresources.
by Yingling Liu on April 21, 2006 A new round of wind power concession projects opened for bidding on April 10, according to China’s National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC).
by Yingling Liu on April 6, 2006 China Petroleum Chemical Corporation (Sinopec), Asia's biggest oil refiner, announced on April 3 that it has discovered China's largest and richest "marine facies" gas field thus far, in western Sichuan Province.
by Yingling Liu on March 28, 2006 On March 26, the United Nations Industrial Development Organization (UNIDO) inaugurated the new International Center for the Promotion and Transfer of Solar Energy Technology, based in Lanzhou, the capital of China's Northwest Gansu Province.
by Zijun Li on February 7, 2006 China's power shortage eased considerably in 2005, and the situation will continue to improve in 2006, according to a recent report by the Development Research Center of the State Council, China's parliament.
by Zijun Li on January 19, 2006 China and five other nations have agreed to create a new multi-million dollar fund to promote cleaner energy technologies, reports EurActiv.com.
by Zijun Li on January 18, 2006 China's landmark renewable energy law took effect on January 1, prompting the government to issue a number of pertinent new rules and technical criteria.
by Yingling Liu on January 17, 2006 China and India have agreed to establish an annual dialogue on energy in a move to strengthen bi-lateral cooperation, according to Shanghai Securities News.
by Zijun Li on January 11, 2006 China's economy grew by an average of 9.9 percent between 1993 and 2004, accelerating the demand for electricity and necessitating expansion of the country's disperse power transmission and distribution network.
by Yingling Liu on December 9, 2005 China National Offshore Oil Corporation (CNOOC) will partner with U.S. Devon Energy Corporation to develop oil and natural gas reserves in the eastern part of the South China Sea.
by Yingling Liu on November 10, 2005 The municipal government of Shanghai recently launched an initiative to install photovoltaic (PV) systems on 100,000 of the city's 6 million rooftops, reported Xinhua News Agency.
by Yingling Liu on November 8, 2005 Prioritizing the exploitation and use of renewable energy is the only way for the world to deal with its growing energy and environmental problems and achieve sustainable development, Chinese President Hu Jintao stated at a recent global gathering. He made the remarks in a written speech to the 2005 Beijing International Renewable Energy Conference, convened at the Great Hall of the People on November 7-8, Xinhua News Agency reported.
by Yingling Liu on October 31, 2005 Authorities in China's Jiangsu Province announced earlier this month that they will increase investments and expand installed capacity of the Rudong County wind farm, making it likely to become the world's largest, according to Oriental Morning Post.
by Zijun Li on October 13, 2005 Al Gore, the former vice president of the United States, gave a speech on global warming to about 700 Tsinghua University students in Beijing on October 10. In his address he warned that the world's people are facing a huge global environmental crisis and that Hurricane Katrina could mark the first of many more visible impacts related to global warming, according to Xinhua Net.
by Zijun Li on October 7, 2005 At the 18 th World Petroleum Congress in Johannesburg, South Africa, last month, Worldwatch President Christopher Flavin told Reuters that China will likely be a world leader in renewable energy within the next five years.
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Analysis
by Yingling Liu on January 15, 2008 The
State Council, China’s cabinet, recently issued a directive banning the
production of ultra-thin plastic bags. The ruling
also prohibits shops, supermarkets, and sales outlets nationwide from handing
out free plastic bags starting on June 1.
by Yingling Liu on December 6, 2007 In the past several months, fuel scarcity has once again swept over much
of China:
drivers queuing for hours outside filling stations only to get a few liters of
rationed fuel, or simply being turned away by dry nozzles.
by Yingling Liu on November 29, 2007 In her essay, “The
Great Leap Backward?” ( Foreign
Affairs, September/October 2007), author Elisabeth Economy offers valuable
insights into the unprecedented scale of environmental problems China now faces.
by Yongfeng Feng on November 1, 2007 Every city needs someone to take care of its garbage. The most resource-efficient
way to dispose of urban trash is to recycle and reuse it. But this is more difficult than it sounds, especially in Beijing.
by Yongfeng Feng on October 23, 2007 The upcoming Summer Olympic Games have galvanized the host city of Beijing
into a frenzy of efforts to beautify its image. But are these “image” fix-ups eating away at funds needed to tackle more fundamental challenges, such as solid waste, sewage,
and air pollution?
by Jiaquan Wang on August 28, 2007 In recent years, Chinese authorities have waged a series of “green storms”—harsh crackdown campaigns against polluters—to check the nation’s worsening environmental deterioration, while also promoting a “green credit” system to deny polluting industries access to bank loans.
by Renjie Zhou and Yadan Wang on August 14, 2007 Every year, gusting winds from Inner Mongolia’s sprawling desert—a 150,000-square-kilometer area the size of the U.S. state of Georgia—threaten China’s capital Beijing with damaging sandstorms.
by Jiahua Pan on July 24, 2007 As the global temperature warms, how to deal with climate change has become a hot topic among the international community.
by Jianqiang Liu on July 19, 2007 Confronted with deteriorating environmental pollution, China's urban middle class has started expressing its anger through mass protests, achieving an initial success that is still rare throughout the country.
by Yongfeng Feng on June 28, 2007 The Chinese people are used to dividing their country into three parts—the East, the Middle, and the West.
by Wang Jiaquan on June 21, 2007 As greenhouse gas emissions erupt with the rising consumption of fossil fuels, the world’s highest plateau keeps sending alerts to the planet.
by Lila Buckley on June 14, 2007 As the countdown to the 2008 Olympics intensifies, China is struggling to work out its modern identity in almost every sphere of life.
by Ryan Hodum on June 5, 2007 Traveling across China, it’s hard not to notice a unique and environmentally benign technology that has been gracefully integrated into urban buildings and other structures
by Zuo Xuan on May 29, 2007 Last year, China’s southwestern city of Chongqing, located along the upper reaches of the Yangtze River, suffered from its worst drought in half a century.
by Guiyang Zhuang on May 24, 2007 China must shift to a low-carbon economy. This is not just because of the high pressure from the international community to curb greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, but also because of the rising domestic exploitation of the nation's natural resources.
by Lila Buckley on April 24, 2007 Since its founding in 1949, modern China has implemented hydropower as a priority strategy for its rapid economic development. In a country where the history of hydraulic innovation dates back to the 590s BCE, China’s recent dams are a source of national pride and, according to the Chinese National Committee on Large Dams, “symbolize the further greater progress of dam construction in China.”
by Yingling Liu on March 13, 2007 The recent agreement between China’s top forestry authority and one of the nation’s biggest energy giants to develop biofuels plantations in the southwest reflects rising Chinese attention to non-fossil energy sources. But the excitement may come at great environmental loss...
by Jianxiang Yang on February 13, 2007 After years of short supply, China achieved a balance in its electricity production and consumption in mid-2006. The relief, however, is temporary. Concerns over supply remain high as the booming economy leads to ever-higher demand, while capacity is insufficient with limited or dwindling energy resources.
by Yingling Liu on February 8, 2007 The State Council, China’s parliament, recently endorsed a plan to accelerate closure of the nation’s smaller coal-fired power plants.
by Jiao Li on January 23, 2007 Everyone seems eager to get a share of China’s biofuels pie. Liang Yulin, a 28-year-old real estate tycoon in southern China’s Guangzhou City, began investing in biodiesel production last October. Using palm oil imported from Southeast Asia, the manager of the Guangzhou Tinyo Real Estate Development Company plans to turn out 50 tons a day, selling the fuel to fishing boats that work around the Pear River Delta.
by Lila Buckley on December 19, 2006 As nations struggle to agree on post-2012 approaches to global warming, China has come under scrutiny for being the world’s second-largest emitter of greenhouse gases yet not having any mandatory emissions reduction scheme in place. Critics argue that after the so-called “carbon trading mechanisms” under the Kyoto Protocol expire in 2012, rapidly developing countries like China and India should be required to comply with mandatory emissions caps.
by Ling Li on November 21, 2006 In its World Energy Outlook 2006, launched November 7, the International Energy Agency (IEA) projected that China will pass the United States to become the world’s largest emitter of carbon dioxide by 2010.
by Jianxiang Yang on October 26, 2006 Statistics show that in 2005, a total of US$38 billion was invested in renewable energy development worldwide. China topped the list with a commitment of US$6 billion, excluding spending on large hydropower projects.
by Yingling Liu on October 12, 2006 Enter a typical Chinese restaurant, and it’s not hard to notice the chef’s generous use of cooking oil. Famous for their fried, stirred, and boiled offerings, China’s kitchens also generate millions of tons of cooked oil residue each year.
by Li Jiao on October 3, 2006 Under the world’s biggest emissions-reduction purchase deal to date, two Chinese chemical companies will reduce their emissions of HFC-23 (trifluoromethane), a powerful greenhouse gas, starting in October and December.
by Zijun Li on July 11, 2006 A new study released on June 29 by the International Energy Agency estimates that world energy demand for lighting will be 80 percent higher in 2030 than today if no immediate action is taken.
by Zijun Li on June 15, 2006 Next month marks the expiration date for the European Union’s stringent anti-dumping duty on Chinese compact fluorescent lamps (CFLs), imposed in July 2001.
by Zijun Li on June 1, 2006 In recognition of the grave perils of increasing desertification, the United Nations has declared 2006 the International Year of Deserts and Desertification and the theme of World Environment Day on June 5, 2006 is, "Don't Desert Drylands!".
by Lila Buckley on May 26, 2006 This spring, northwestern China has endured some of the worst sandstorms in recent memory, resulting in severe air pollution, economic losses, and casualties throughout the region. As images of Beijing’s yellow skies make international headlines and Chinese officials pour billions of yuan into anti-desertification projects, Inner Mongolia continues to lose its topsoil and local herders lack grassland space on which to graze their cattle.
by Yingling Liu on May 19, 2006 China, a country with one of the world’s largest wind energy potentials, has seen tremendous growth in its wind power development in recent years.
by Zijun Li on May 16, 2006 Little more than a year after the Kyoto Protocol entered into force, a key element of the agreement, the Clean Development Mechanism (CDM), has begun to take shape. Under this market-based instrument, industrial-country polluters can offset their emissions of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases (GHGs) by supporting emissions-reducing projects in the developing world.
by Yingling Liu on March 30, 2006 It came as a great shock to nearly everyone in the wind industry. In January, China's National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC) issued a regulation reversing its earlier intention to price wind power through a "feed-in tariff," a pricing policy that analysts and industry insiders had hoped would provide a big boost to Chinese wind energy development.
by Yingling Liu on December 22, 2005 The success of Suntech is a story of the embodiment of the ancient Chinese wisdom of "perfect timing, advantageous location, and kind assistance," and of the opportune adoption of the western concept of "innovation drives growth."
by Yingling Liu on November 29, 2005 The Nu River dam project, suspended by Premier Wen Jiabao in April 2004 after a heated controversy, got a boost after local officials proposed a smaller-scale project while lobbying the premier during his trip to the Yunnan province in July.
by Zijun Li on November 10, 2005 China's coal-mining industry is among the most dangerous in the world, resulting in the deaths of more than 2,600 workers in the first half of 2005 alone. As accidents occur with alarming frequency, the country is boosting its coal production at the high price of miners' lives.
by Zijun Li on November 2, 2005 According to a new study from the environmental group Greenpeace, China's rapidly growing southern province of Guangdong could support 20 gigawatts (GW) of wind generating capacity by 2020, providing as much as 35,000 gigawatt-hours (GWh) of clean electricity annually, the equivalent of 17 percent of Guangdong's total current demand.
by Zijun Li on October 20, 2005 The Chinese government has included a goal of building an energy-efficient, less resource-intensive society in a new proposal that feeds into the 11 th Five-Year Plan of 2006-2010. The proposal, adopted at the October 11 meeting of the Communist Party Central Committee, will play a critical role in shaping the country's development in the coming decades.
by Yingling Liu on October 6, 2005 As the Chinese government seeks to include even more cities in its ambitious push to embrace ethanol fuel, these projects now face a major setback due to rising grain shortages. Ethanol, blended with gasoline, produces an environmentally friendly vehicle fuel. It is produced from crops such as sugar cane, grain, and cassava, and its use can substantially cut oil demand and reduce greenhouse gas emissions.
by Zijun Li on September 23, 2005 The city of Beijing, China’s second-largest energy consumer, has announced plans to build a “solar street” where buildings, streetlights, and other features will run entirely on energy from the sun. A second pilot project in the city’s Xuanwu Park will introduce solar power for lighting, heating, and refrigeration.
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News Updates
by Ling Li on August 23, 2007 Early last month, China’s top environmental authority, the State Environmental Protection Administration (SEPA), announced a decision to suspend the approval of all new industrial projects in 13 cities and industrial parks along four major rivers that are suffering from severe water pollution—the Hai, Huai, Yangtze, and Yellow.
by Ling Li on June 26, 2007 A large outbreak of blue-green algae last month on eastern China’s Lake Tai—the country’s third largest freshwater lake—has contaminated the main drinking water source of Wuxi, cutting the tap water supply for the city’s 2 million residents for almost three days.
by Jianqiang Liu on May 1, 2007 China is home to three of the top ten “rivers at risk” worldwide, according to a report released in March by the conservation group WWF.
by Ling Li on April 17, 2007 China’s Ministry of Agriculture has announced that the nation will expand its corn output to more than 150 million tons on some 26.8 million hectares of land in 2010, up from 144 million tons last year. The move is fueled by booming corn demand for livestock feed and industrial uses.
by Ling Li on April 3, 2007 The recent closing of China’s first organic supermarket, the “O Store” in Shanghai, due to poor sales has dimmed the vision of eating organic among some Chinese consumers. Middle-class residents of big cities like Shanghai and Beijing are the group most likely to buy organic food, but many have expressed frustration over the higher prices.
by Ling Li on March 6, 2007 A multibillion-dollar channel to be completed this year aims to transfer water over hundreds of kilometers from China’s Yangtze River to the North China Plain, bringing Beijing an extra 1.2 billion cubic meters of water a year to address its worsening water scarcity.
by Ling Li on February 27, 2007 Earlier this month, China’s National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC), Ministry of Water Resources, and Ministry of Construction jointly released a water-saving plan to cut the nation’s water use per unit of gross domestic product (GDP) by 20 percent within five years.
by Ling Li on December 21, 2006 In early December, the Yellow River, China’s second longest, turned red for the third time in three consecutive months. The discoloration, which authorities say was caused by industrial contamination, occurred in the section of the river running through Lanzhou, the capital of western Gansu province and a city of 2 million people.
by Yingling Liu on November 9, 2006 As of the end of 2005, China was desalinating 120,000 cubic meters of seawater daily, the National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC), the country’s top economic planner, told the People’s Daily.
by Ke Zhang on September 26, 2006 On September 14, a Beijing-based environmental organization began operating China’s first public database of nationwide water pollution. The so-called China Water Pollution Map enables users to survey water quality, monitor pollution discharges, and track pollution sources using digital mapping.
by Yingling Liu on August 3, 2006 At a July 25 national meeting on legal enforcement of the protection of drinking water sources, China’s environmental authorities concluded that the country’s water quality situation remains grim.
by Yingling Liu on July 25, 2006 A recent study by the Hebei Bureau of Hydrology and Water Resources Survey estimates that the shallow groundwater table at China’s central Hebei Plain, south of Beijing, will drop 16.2 meters on average by 2030, while the deep groundwater table will fall up to 39.9 meters on average.
by Yingling Liu on April 18, 2006 A survey released last month by China’s Ministry of Land and Resources revealed that the country has lost 8 million hectares, or 6.6 percent, of its arable land in the past decade.
by Zijun Li on March 14, 2006 The Chinese government recently passed a new regulation on water management, updating its system of use permits and stipulating charges for water consumption in agriculture.
by Zijun Li on February 3, 2006 The Asian Development Bank (ADB) is financing a US $2 billion environmental improvement project in the Songhua River area of northeastern China, according to an ADB official in Harbin, the capital of Heilongjiang province.
by Zijun Li on December 6, 2005 The rapid development of urbanization and regional economies has increased demands on local water resources, while simultaneously causing deterioration in the quality of urban groundwater in many cities.
by Yingling Liu on November 30, 2005 The city of Harbin, the capital of Northeast China's Heilongjiang Province, resumed water supply to its 3.8 million residents on November 27, five hours ahead of schedule. The city cut off its water supply for four days after a chemical explosion spilled some 100 tons of pollutants containing benzene and nitrobenzene into its main water source, the Songhua River.
by Zijun Li on November 29, 2005 The results of a 2005 marine environmental protection inspection released by the State Environmental Protection Administration (SEPA) on November 28th showed that in spite of improvement of marine conditions in some coastal areas, the overall quality of China’s marine environment remains dire.
by Zijun Li on October 19, 2005 As of late June, 297 cities in China had not yet built adequate sewage treatment plants, an official with the Ministry of Construction reported on October 10th. Of these nearly 300 cities, 63 are larger urban areas, including 8 with populations of more than 500,000.
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Analysis
by Yingling Liu on November 8, 2007 The waters off China’s
eastern and northeastern coasts, home to the country’s major seafood production
and fish farms, have become a giant dumping ground for chemical wastes.
by Lila Buckley on September 27, 2007 Nestled in the dusty northern suburbs of Beijing, the village of Baige Zhuang seems like an unlikely birthplace for fine Italian wines and cheeses.
by Lila Buckley on September 11, 2007 Government officials and researchers in China are increasingly trying to solve the economic piece of the nation’s environmental puzzle.
by Hujun Li on August 2, 2007 A battle between humans and mice is raging in the Dongting Lake area of China’s Hunan Province. According to the province’s Department of Agriculture, the number of mice in the area has exploded to up to 2 billion in recent months.
by Wang Jiaquan on July 26, 2007 For years, eastern China’s Jiangsu province has proudly led the rest of the country in economic production.
by Ryan Hodum on February 1, 2007 The majority of infrastructure installations in China today mirror those of the United States in the 1950s. The recent national goal to install wastewater treatment plants throughout the country is no exception.
by Jianqiang Liu on January 30, 2007 Chinese bodies have been put at risk for decades. Twenty years ago, people were afraid to speak out against the government. But today, they are expressing growing concern about the contamination of their food, water, and air.
by Ling Li on January 9, 2007 Nearly 312 million rural Chinese residents have no access to safe drinking water, facing problems of shortage as well as severe contamination. These rural populations, typically the most disadvantaged groups in China, suffer frequent and serious health attacks as a result of drinking unsafe water.
by Lei Xiong on December 12, 2006 While enjoying an impressive increase in meat consumption from 13.4 kilograms per person in 1980 to 53 kilograms in 2004, China is also experiencing the negative impacts of this “livestock revolution,” according to agronomists. When the country introduced livestock factory farms in the late 1970s to meet the rising demand for meat, milk, and eggs, few policymakers foresaw the “serious environmental consequences” of this intensive production system.
by Yan Zhan on November 28, 2006 The water in Zhao Bo’s village on the outskirts of Beijing was a sickly shade of green. After drinking from the local well, Zhao and his fellow villagers could not go a month without suffering from diarrhea. The contamination was believed to originate from a zinc-plating plant established...
by Zijun Li on July 27, 2006 China’s arable land, which feeds 22 percent of the world’s population, is facing grim pollution and degradation, warns Zhou Xiansheng, director of the State Environmental Protection Agency (SEPA).
by Lila Buckley on July 18, 2006 An hour’s drive north of Beijing lies the county of Miyun, a semi-mountainous agricultural suburb that is home to the Miyun Reservoir, the single-largest water source for China’s burgeoning capital city. Although the local government has invested billions of dollars in tree planting and other ecological protection initiatives and imposed a ban on chemical fertilizers in the region, dangers such as erosion, overgrazing, and pollution continue to threaten the livelihoods of local residents.
by Yingling Liu on June 20, 2006 It is not sensational to predict that if China ever moves its capital city, this will be due largely to water shortages. The current capital, Beijing, is exuding dryness from every pore, particularly during the spring and fall when it is plagued by inland sandstorms and strong winds.
by Lila Buckley on March 2, 2006 BEIJING—In Chinese development theory, the saying goes that if you build a road, the wealth will follow. That is precisely what government officials have promised unemployed fish farmer Yi Zhuzhi once the new super highway connecting his remote village to larger cities in Yunnan province and neighboring Burma is completed. But Yi is skeptical that this will solve any "real dilemmas" he and other villagers face.
by Lila Buckley on February 28, 2006 BEIJING—A new monthly newsletter, Organic Trends, was recently launched in Beijing with the aim of promoting "environmentally friendly and healthy food production and processing" nationwide.
by Zijun Li on February 23, 2006 Three months after a chemical plant explosion contaminated northeastern China's Songhua River, a second large spill occurred on the upper reaches of the Yuexi River in southeastern Sichuan province, releasing toxins into a 100-kilometer stretch near the city of Yibin on February 14 and disrupting the water supply of some 20,000 people.
by Yingling Liu on February 2, 2006 Chinese scientists believe that breeding new drought-tolerant crop varieties is key to easing the country's chronic water scarcity, according to Xinhua News Agency.
by Yingling Liu on October 19, 2005 As temperatures and human pressures have increased in China’s mountainous west over the past decade, the headwaters of two major river arteries, the Yellow and the Yangtze, are drying up at an alarming rate. The Chinese government has poured in money and other resources in an attempt to reverse or mitigate this trend, but observers remain pessimistic about finding a long-term cure.
by Yingling Liu on September 22, 2005 In late August, legislators in Beijing met to discuss China’s first-ever comprehensive law on animal husbandry, pushing meat safety to the top of the national agenda at a time when avian flu and other livestock-related diseases are ravaging parts of Asia. The bill, initially proposed in 2001, underwent legislative review at the 17 th meeting of the Standing Committee of the National People's Congress (NPC), convened August 23-28.
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News Updates
by Ling Li on August 7, 2007 The Research and Breeding Center for Giant Pandas in Chengdu, the capital of southwestern China’s Sichuan Province, is offering a new line of panda-themed souvenirs made from the animals’ manure.
by Ling Li on May 10, 2007 The future of the Chinese Sturgeon, a large migrating fish that has survived in the Yangtze River for nearly 140 million years, is increasingly threatened by pollution, damming, overfishing, and heavy boat traffic in the waterway.
by Shan Sun on April 12, 2007 Two renowned Chinese biologists recently called on the central government to ban the consumption of endangered wild animals by government officials. Xu Zhihong, the president of Peking University, and Pan Wenshi, a professor at the university, recommended that the government enact laws to prohibit officials from eating rare or endangered wildlife items such as shark fin, abalone, giant salamander, and spotted deer, and that it evaluate all government representatives on their eating behavior.
by Jianqiang Liu on October 31, 2006 The Chinese public has won a rare battle against the country’s State Forestry Administration (SFA) by preventing 289 wild animals, including several endangered species, from being hunted down.
by Zijun Li on September 12, 2006 Over the past three months, the Amazonian Snail, also known as the golden apple snail, has wreaked havoc on public health and agricultural land in China. Since June, the city of Beijing has reported 131 cases of people infected with Angiostrongylus cantonensis, a lungworm parasite carried by the mollusk, which is native to South America.
by Yingling Liu on March 23, 2006 Only 0.1 percent of China's intact forest landscapes—which cover an area of 55,448 square kilometers, or 2 percent of the nation's total forest resources—are under strict protection.
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Analysis
by Yongfeng Feng on September 20, 2007 China is witnessing a dangerous trend. The country’s policy of returning farmland to forests is faltering, and many areas are opting out of this activity in a push to protect local farmers.
by Lila Buckley on September 4, 2007 For most people, images of prayer flags blowing in the wind, intricately decorated monasteries, and nomads riding across open grasslands do not immediately bring to mind national parks and bird watching.
by Yongfeng Feng and Yingling Liu on August 21, 2007 One of the biggest priorities in China today, according to the central government, is to “save energy and reduce emissions.” But another important indicator of environmental health is the quantity and quality of big trees the country harbors.
by Lila Buckley on August 16, 2007 For the last several decades, China’s leaders have grappled with a challenging conservation dilemma. Home to some of the world’s most endangered species, the country has scrambled to set up nature reserves and parks to temper the effects of rapid economic development.
by Yunwu Cao on July 17, 2007 The Three Gorges Botanical Garden for Rare and Specious Plants, located in Chongqing in western China, was closed on June 9 due to funding shortages.
by Li Zhang on June 12, 2007 For the first time ever, scientists recently captured clear footage of a wild Indo-Chinese tiger in a nature reserve in China’s southeastern Yunnan Province.
by Yongfeng Feng on April 10, 2007 The global paper giant Asia Pulp & Paper (APP) has advertised its slogan, “ecological plantations, environmental pulp, green paper,” everywhere around Hainan Province. It has also won over officials in this southern island province.
by Yongfeng Feng on April 5, 2007 On March 28, Greenpeace China announced its discovery that the paper giant Asia Pulp & Paper (APP) has planted a large area of eucalyptus trees for pulp and paper making in Yingge Mountain Provincial Conservation Area, in southern China’s Hainan Province
by Ling Li on December 28, 2006 The international expedition that recently declared the Yangtze River dolphin, or baiji, “functionally extinct” has called the disappearance of the species “a loss not only for China, but for the entire world.”
by Dongping Yang on November 2, 2006 Last month, China’s State Forestry Administration (SFA) tried to hold the nation’s first-ever auction of wildlife hunting licenses. The event, which was cancelled following widespread public protest, would have granted foreigners the right to hunt and kill several endangered species, including the Tibetan antelope and the wild yak.
by Kejia Zhang on September 14, 2006 Earlier this month, the Chinese government put into effect a new regulation tightening its oversight of the import and export of endangered plant and animal species. The law, which delineates the roles of specific government agencies in managing the wildlife trade, reflects China’s determination to crack down on illegal trading activity.
by Yongfeng Feng and Yingling Liu on August 31, 2006 At 62 percent, Fujian Province boasts the highest forest coverage rate in China. Yet as its natural forests are replaced with fast-growing tree plantations, the province has experienced worsening flooding and other natural disasters in recent years.
by Yongfeng Feng on August 29, 2006 It was around 5:00 p.m. when I arrived in Xinan, a small town in Xiapu County in China’s southeastern Fujian Province. A handful of young people came up to greet me, saying they would accompany me to Fuzhu Village, 14 kilometers away, after dinner. It will still be light then, they said, and you’ll be able to see the hills where natural forests were cut down two years ago, as well as the sites where they replanted eucalyptus last year.
by Yingling Liu on July 6, 2006 Thousands of hectares of natural forests are being eliminated to make room for fast-growing tree plantations in Liu Shun County in southwestern Yunnan province.
by Yingling Liu on April 6, 2006 As environmentalists lament the rapid loss of forest landscapes in southwestern China's Yunnan Province, they may now have an unlikely ally in their efforts to preserve this biologically diverse region: pig geneticists.
by Zijun Li on November 30, 2005 Due to the robust demand for its wool in the United States and Europe, Tibetan antelope, an endangered species at the top of both China's and international protection lists, has been decimated by poaching—the population shrank sharply from an estimated 1 million in 1900 to around
by Yingling Liu on October 31, 2005 As disposable incomes rise in China, the desire to alter the landscape is intensifying. City authorities, tired of the same old surrounding flora, are eager to revitalize streets and parks with new and exotic greenery. Meanwhile, desertification researchers, faced with worsening sandstorms from China’s barren deserts, are keen to find more permanent methods for holding back the drifting sand.
by Lila Buckley on September 22, 2005 Unless rainfall increases by at least 80 percent over last year, the remaining surface water in China’s 100,000 hectare Xianghai State Nature Reserve could dry up completely by the end of 2006. Loss of the massive wetland area would likely take the future of several of the world’s rare and endangered bird species with it.
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News Updates
by Ling Li on May 3, 2007 China’s State Environmental Protection Administration (SEPA) unveiled a new transparency rule last month requiring all government environmental agencies and polluting companies to disclose important environmental information to the public. The rule will take effect in May 2008, along with a new regulation recently issued by the State Council to open up access to government information to ensure greater official transparency nationwide.
by Ling Li on February 6, 2007 The Chinese government will provide a total of 1.3 billion yuan (US$167 million) this year to help Beijing’s bus companies reduce fares to only 1 yuan (US$0.13) per ride. Passengers and students using the “smart card,” an electronic debit card for transportation, will pay even less—only 40 cents (US$0.05) and 20 cents (US$.025), respectively.
by Zijun Li on August 1, 2006 Chinese airlines reported losses of 2.57 billion RMB (US $320 million) in the first half of 2006, a decline attributed to the rise in oil prices to nearly $80 a barrel.
by Zijun Li on April 21, 2006 At a recent China-U.S. workshop on aviation fuel, experts forecasted that the demand for jet fuel in China’s booming civil aviation sector would reach 15 to 17 million tons by 2010, nearly double the record 9.3 million tons consumed in 2005.
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Analysis
by Lila Buckley on October 10, 2006 With the completion of the Qinghai-Tibet Railway this summer, China is now home to not only the world’s largest dam and longest wall, but also its highest railroad. “China has rewritten the world's history,” the railway’s official website proclaims, sporting photos of the train conquering the “unsurmountable” Kunlun Mountains as children wave from thriving grasslands below.
by Yingling Liu on March 9, 2006 Rush hour is usually a nightmare for Beijing's bus commuters. Squeezed from all sides, riders endure polluted air and chilly winter winds that seep in through gaps in the windows, or suffer en masse in the scorching summer sun.
by Zijun Li on January 26, 2006 In early January, China called for a nationwide repeal of restrictions on smaller, more economical cars by the end of March in a move to ease the country's growing dependence on imported oil.
by Yingling Liu on September 28, 2005 In mid-August, China’s aviation administration, CAAC, issued a series of new policies aimed at increasing private investment in the civil aviation sector, according to a recent report released by the Center for Asia Pacific Aviation.
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News Updates
by Ling Li on May 22, 2007 A new survey of childhood lead poisoning in 15 Chinese cities reveals that in Beijing, 7 percent of children under the age of six have lead levels in their blood that exceed the national standard.
by Zijun Li on August 31, 2006 Acid rain caused by worsening air pollution now affects one-third of China’s landmass, threatening soil quality and food safety, according to Sheng Huaren, vice chairman of the standing committee of China’s National People’s Congress.
by Zijun Li on August 24, 2006 China's urban citizens will soon be facing higher water bills as the country imposes a new charge for city sewage treatment later this year.
by Zijun Li on April 11, 2006 A new publication, Disease Control Priorities in Developing Countries, identifies four key challenges faced by the public health sector in the developing world: the transformation of epidemiology, the HIV/AIDS epidemic, the emergence of new diseases, and high sanitation imbalances among countries.
by Zijun Li on January 6, 2006 In 2005, China was plagued by all manner of natural disasters, from floods, typhoons, and earthquakes to droughts, blizzards, and landslides.
by Zijun Li on October 26, 2005 Concern about the widespread use of carcinogenic polyvinylchloride (PVC) food wrap in Chinese supermarkets has caught the attention of both the media and the Chinese government in recent weeks. While most food wraps sold for home use in China are made of safer alternatives, PVC plastic is still used to seal vegetables, fruits, meat, and other cooked food in supermarkets nationwide.
by Yingling Liu on October 26, 2005 A public health official warned on Saturday that China will likely see a widespread AIDS pandemic if timely counter measures are not adopted, according to Xinhua News Agency.
by Yingling Liu on October 20, 2005 A fresh outbreak of avian flu is reported to have taken place at a poultry farm in Tengjiaying Village, Inner Mongolia, killing 2,600 birds, Xinhua News Agency reported on October 19. China’s national bird flu laboratory confirmed it was the H5N1 strain, which is potentially lethal to humans.
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Analysis
by Wang Jiaquan on July 26, 2007 For years, eastern China’s Jiangsu province has proudly led the rest of the country in economic production.
by Jianqiang Liu on July 19, 2007 Confronted with deteriorating environmental pollution, China's urban middle class has started expressing its anger through mass protests, achieving an initial success that is still rare throughout the country.
by Yongfeng Feng on May 15, 2007 Since March, large numbers of visitors from China's national climbing team, the China Meteorological Bureau, and the China Space Technology group have flocked to Mount Everest's base camp to prepare for the delivery of the 2008 Olympic flame to the world’s highest peak.
by Zijun Li on February 14, 2006 In a recent study of overcast versus cloud-free days in China, researchers from the U.S. Department of Energy’s Pacific Northwest National Laboratory found that the amount of sunlight reaching the ground at 500 measurement stations in China fell dramatically between 1954 and 2001.
by Lila Buckley on October 12, 2005 More than 4,000 doctors, scientists, medical students, lawyers, foreign investors, corporate representatives, and journalists from 43 countries convened in Chengdu, China, in late September to attend the Second International Conference on the Modernization of Chinese Medicine.
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News Updates
by Xiaohua Sun on March 20, 2007 China is drafting its first law on creating a so-called “circular economy” to provide a legal framework for its national sustainable development strategy, the country’s top environmental legislator announced recently.
by Ke Zhang on February 20, 2007 Starting in 2008, China will expand its recent Regional Permit Restriction to provinces nationwide in an effort to push them to achieve pollution reduction goals
by Lei Yang on January 18, 2007 A recent measure by the State Environmental Protection Administration (SEPA) to blacklist cities and industries that violate state environmental regulations represents the strictest administrative penalty yet to stem Chinese environmental degradation. On January 10, Pan Yue, vice minister of SEPA, announced the new Regional Permit Restriction, a ruling that suspends or restricts all construction projects owned by the laggard industries until they come into compliance with the law.
by Ling Li on January 16, 2007 China’s State Environmental Protection Administration (SEPA) recently suspended 82 major construction projects, representing 112.3 billion yuan (US$14.4 billion) in investments, for violating state environmental regulations.
by Zijun Li on August 22, 2006 A recent study by China’s National Development Reform Commission reports that the country’s Gini Index, a measure of household income distribution, has reached 0.4 (up from 0.37 in 2003), indicating that the rich-poor gap nationwide continues to grow.
by Zijun Li on August 8, 2006 Shanghai’s Civil Defense Office recently announced completion of the city’s largest subterranean bunker, spanning an area of over 90,000 square meters.
by Yingling Liu on April 13, 2006 More than 100 villagers rampaged through a tannery complex in Quanzhou in China’s eastern Fujian Province on April 9, attacking several factories over their air and water pollution.
by Yingling Liu on March 21, 2006 China's population was 1,306,280,000 on November 1, 2005, according to the latest census report released by China's National Bureau of Statistics on March 16. The number, which excludes Hong Kong, Macao, and Taiwan, was estimated to reach 1,307,560,000 by the end of 2005.
by Zijun Li on March 7, 2006 China's National Development and Reform Committee (NDRC) announced that eight schools overcharged parents to the tune of 22.7 million RMB (US $2.84 million) during the 2004-05 period, Xinhua News reported on February 19.
by Yingling Liu on February 24, 2006 BEIJING—The State Environmental Protection Administration (SEPA), China’s top environmental body, has released a tentative measure on public involvement in the nation’s Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) process.
by Zijun Li on December 2, 2005 China's cabinet today approved the resignation request of Xie Zhenhua, director of the State Environmental Protection Administration (SEPA).
by Zijun Li on November 13, 2005 Shenyang, a northeastern Chinese city that has experienced rapid urbanization in recent years, will eliminate the formal distinction between urban and rural residents, granting 800,000 rural dwellers urban rights over the next five years, Xinhua Net reported in early November.
by Zijun Li on November 8, 2005 Recognizing that rampant collusion between local officials and private mine owners is the main reason for poor safety conditions in China's coal mines, the central government has stepped-up efforts to root out this corruption. Among other moves, it has begun shutting down illegal coalmines, ordering local officials to withdraw their investments in mines, and strictly punishing officials who attempt to circumvent government investigations.
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Analysis
by Lila Buckley on October 18, 2007 For the average urban Chinese, the country’s severe environmental problems are no secret. And increasingly, recent college
graduates are looking to China’s
growing civil society sector to forge their career paths.
by Jianqiang Liu on June 19, 2007 China’s worsening environmental crisis is catalyzing a growing environmental movement in which the public is resisting special interest groups and opposing the government’s environmentally “unfriendly” behaviors.
by Lila Buckley on May 17, 2007 Last month, in a creative new approach to China’s environmental protection efforts, U.S. artists joined Chinese students and teachers in a group mural design and painting project. The experience brought together 88 children from 11 schools in Beijing, Hangzhou, Hebei, and Shanghai to design, plan, and paint a mural on the “Spirit of the Green Olympics” at the Beijing campus of the China National Children’s Center.
by Xiong Lei on April 26, 2007 In January, an official with the HIV/AIDS Prevention Committee of China's Gansu province announced a desire to find community partners to promote education on AIDS prevention. When asked why the group didn’t just work with local non-governmental organizations (NGOs), the official explained that grassroots groups were hard to find...
by Hujun Li on March 1, 2007 “Climate negotiations are the most important international negotiations after the WTO.” At least this is what Ji Zou, a professor of environmental economics at the People’s University of China in Beijing, believes. In the summer of 2000, Zhou, then 39, received an official letter from China’s Office of the National Coordination Committee on Climate Change (ONCCCC) inviting him to join the country’s climate delegation.
by Yingling Liu on January 4, 2007 As China undergoes its historic drive toward urbanization, it is also witnessing the rapid accumulation of urban garbage. The nation’s 668 cities generate an estimated 150 million tons of rubbish each year, accounting for roughly one-third of the world total.
by Lila Buckley on December 14, 2006 China’s rapid economic development over the past two decades has occurred mostly along the eastern seaboard, leaving much of the country’s vast western territory badly impoverished and underserved. This unequal distribution of wealth is spurring the largest migration in human history as millions of poverty-stricken westerners head to cities to claim their share of the pie.
by Yun Feng on December 7, 2006 The government of Ganzi Prefecture in China’s Sichuan Province recently announced the cancellation of a local hydroelectric project, signaling the first success by Chinese non-governmental organizations (NGOs) in jointly resisting a state-sponsored dam.
by Yongfeng Feng on October 24, 2006 In today’s China, hundreds of thousands of small and struggling villages are facing a growing dilemma between development and preservation. In this two-part series, journalist Yongfeng Feng describes how one minority village has grappled with this challenge.
by Yongfeng Feng on October 19, 2006 In today’s China, hundreds of thousands of small and struggling villages are facing a growing dilemma between development and preservation. In this two-part series, journalist Yongfeng Feng describes how one minority village has grappled with this challenge.
by Yingling Liu on August 15, 2006 China has entered the stage of an aging society since 1999, and the trend is expected to be irreversible this century. With a growing share of the country’s massive population turning gray, the fragmented pension system faces unprecedented challenges.
by Zijun Li on June 27, 2006 Next year, for the first time ever, more than half the world’s population will live in urban areas. As huge “mega-cities” gain ground across Asia, Latin America, and Africa, developing countries are projected to be home to 80 percent of urban dwellers within the next two decades.
by Lila Buckley on February 21, 2006 Nestled in a small building complex in the heart of Kunming in southwestern China, the Center for Biodiversity and Indigenous Knowledge (CBIK) is easily overlooked. But behind its modest headquarters, this 100-member strong organization is changing the face of development in China's remote western provinces.
by Lila Buckley on January 6, 2006 As this tumultuous year of toxic spills, violent protests, and mining disasters winds down, some Chinese environmentalists are heaving a sigh of relief in anticipation of better days ahead in the Year of the Dog, which begins on January 29.
by Zijun Li on December 16, 2005 China is now the world's third largest buyer of luxury consumer goods, accounting for 12 percent of global demand, according to a Goldman Sachs report released December 11.
by Yingling Liu on December 15, 2005 Two U.S.-based philanthropic organizations faced considerable embarrassment this year when their donations to China were found to contain large quantities of expired medical supplies and second-hand medical equipment. While the details surrounding the cases have yet to be unraveled, the frequency of such events should raise alarm bells.
by Lila Buckley on December 8, 2005 The recent chemical spill on the Songhua River and resulting resignation of China's top environmental official Xie Zhenhua from leadership of the State Environmental Protection Administration ( SEPA) has brought much speculation about the future of Chinese environmental protection efforts.
by Lila Buckley - Jennifer L Turner on November 23, 2005 The environmental movement in China received a setback in late October with the arrest of Hangzhou activist Tan Kai, founder of the monitoring group Green Watch. While charges are unclear, Kai and five other members of the group were brought in for questioning after opening a bank account for the not-yet-registered organization, according to the New York-based organization.
by Zijun Li on September 28, 2005 On September 25, the Chinese government set new regulations on Internet news content, strengthening its control over the operations of online news organizations and the country’s rapidly growing Internet population.
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News Updates
by Jianqiang Liu on December 5, 2006 Over the last three years, the Chinese government has punished 33 multinational corporations for violating the nation’s environmental laws and regulations, according to Ma Jun, director of the nongovernmental Institute of Public & Environmental Affairs.
by Ling Li on November 30, 2006 China’s Ministry of Finance and the State Environmental Protection Administration (SEPA) have announced that starting in 2007, the nation’s central and provincial governments will prioritize their purchasing of environmentally friendly products and services.
by Ling Li on November 7, 2006 China’s investment in environmental protection is projected to grow faster than the county’s gross domestic product (GDP), according to Jun Ma, Greater China chief economist with Deutsche Bank. By 2010, “green” investments will account for 1.6 percent of Chinese GDP, or 1.9 trillion yuan (US$242 billion), growing at an average rate of 16 percent a year until then.
by Zijun Li on September 19, 2006 In its Asian Development Outlook 2006 Update, launched on September 6, the Asian Development Bank (ADB) revised upward its economic growth forecast for China for 2006, from 9.5 percent to 10.4 percent. The Bank also projected full-year growth for 2007 at 9.5 percent.
by Zijun Li on July 20, 2006 Amidst consistently high economic growth, a visible consumer culture is emerging in urban China.
by Zijun Li on June 29, 2006 Despite record-shattering economic growth rates and swift industrialization, a major jobs crisis is brewing in mainland China.
by Zijun Li on May 19, 2006 As Beijing moves forward with construction for the 2008 Summer Olympics, project developers are embracing state-of-the-art energy technologies as well as measures to save water and protect sensitive ecosystems.
by Zijun Li on May 9, 2006 The gap between the Chinese and global pharmaceutical sectors has widened in recent years
by Zijun Li on May 2, 2006 As China’s tourism industry flourishes, the country is poised to become the world’s second largest travel and tourism economy after the United States by 2015, according to a new report from the World Travel & Tourism Council (WTTC).
by Zijun Li on March 23, 2006 Starting April 1, Chinese consumers who buy cars with engine capacities of more than four liters will be required to pay a consumption tax of 20 percent.
by Zijun Li on February 24, 2006 Statistics from the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) indicate that China was the tenth biggest patent applicant in 2005, submitting 2,452 inventions, designs, and other items to the Geneva-based organization, reports China News.
by Yingling Liu on January 23, 2006 The Chinese electric utility Huaneng and the Spanish National Power Corporation Endesa have unveiled a pioneering initiative for purchasing emissions credits generated under the Kyoto Protocol's Clean Development Mechanism (CDM), according to the 21st Century Business Herald.
by Zijun Li on December 12, 2005 On December 7, Nanfang Weekend, a well-known Chinese newspaper, published a ranking of Fortune 500 companies' performance in China, revealing the poor records of the multinational corporations (MNCs) in tax payment, employee welfare, and environmental protection.
by Yingling Liu on December 1, 2005 China is the world's second largest emitter of carbon dioxide, and its new assertiveness on the issue leaves the United States, the world's largest emitter, even more isolated.
by Yingling Liu on November 9, 2005 China is expected to invest over 1,300 billion RMB (US $156.6 billion) in environmental protection between 2006 and 2010, more than 1.5 percent of the country’s GDP over this period, Xie Zhenhua, Director of China’s State Environmental Protection Administration (SEPA), said on Tuesday. Xie made the remark during a speech at the Woodrow Wilson Center for International Scholar's China Environment Forum.
by Yingling Liu on November 8, 2005 As China aims to double its sewage disposal capacity over the next five years, the demand for additional treatment facilities is expected to skyrocket. The Chinese government is extending an invitation to foreign investors to make up for the huge financial shortfall in the country's sewage treatment market.
by Yingling Liu on October 12, 2005 Over 70 percent of China's big cities, more than half of its population of 1.3 billion, and 75 percent of its key industrial and agricultural areas are located in regions prone to weather-related and geological disasters, according to Xinhua News Agency.
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Analysis
by Lila Buckley on September 18, 2007 One of the major barriers to the growth of civil society in China is the lack of funding to support a wide diversity of organizations and projects.
by Jiaquan Wang on March 27, 2007 Seemingly a winner in the global balance of trade, China is in fact struggling against an undercurrent of imported waste. The country, already laden with domestic pollution, is rapidly becoming the planet’s largest garbage dump, facing a huge influx of foreign garbage.
by Yun Feng on December 21, 2006 In Dongguan City in China’s southern Guangdong Province, you can buy a computer laptop for US$100. If you’ve got $200 in your wallet, you can acquire a second large machine, like a copier or fax. Yet even though products “made in China” are known for their low prices, the cheapest high-tech commodities here aren’t locally made. They actually come from the United States, Europe, and Japan, and are imported electronic waste, or “e-waste.”
by Yongfeng Feng on November 16, 2006 Talking just about environmental protection or culture, and not economic realities, will not launch local communities into development. Environmentalists are often accused of being “immoral”—hearing only the desperate cries of ecosystems and not seeing people’s daily struggles against poverty.
by Yongfeng Feng on November 14, 2006 In early September, Xiaoyi Liao, the president of Global Village Environmental Education Center in Beijing, went on a 20-day trip around southwest China’s Guizhou Province. Originally, she had hoped simply to enjoy the peace of the mountains while attending a local conference on village tourism development. But, she says, the situation in Guizhou “woke her up” to the need to take action.
by Jianqiang Liu on September 28, 2006 The Chinese government released its first “green” gross domestic product (GDP) report earlier this month, presenting an alternative to the nation’s current economic development path.
by Lila Buckley on September 5, 2006 Laojun Mountain has long been considered sacred to the Chinese minority groups who call it home. Flanking the foothills of the Himalaya in northwestern Yunnan province, the region contains more than 100 species of wild rhododendron, nearly 100 known mammal species, and over 150 distinct bird species. Many of these plants and animals are highly endangered, including two species of the Yunnan Golden Monkey, of which less than 1,500 exist in the wild.
by Yingling Liu on May 4, 2006 In recent years, environmentalists in China and elsewhere have expressed rising concern about the large quantities of electronic waste (“e-waste”) that wealthy countries continue to dump in the developing world, particularly in Asia.
by Zijun Li on February 22, 2006 European reaction to an ever-growing mountain of discarded cell phones, computers, televisions, MP3 players, and other electronics equipment has put companies in China and elsewhere in a scramble to respond.
by Zijun Li on December 23, 2005 A Beijing district court ruled that China's top Internet search provider, Baidu.com, infringed the copyrights of 34 recordings belonging to the Shanghai-based agency Push Sound and must pay US $10,000 dollars in compensation.
by Zijun Li on December 12, 2005 In the past month alone, China has suffered from two very serious human-caused disasters. Less then two weeks after a November 13 chemical plant explosion in Jilin province released a flood of toxins into the Songhua River, a blast at Dongfeng coal mine in the northeastern province of Heilongjiang killed 171 miners.
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Over the last three years, the Chinese government has punished 33 multinational corporations for violating the nation’s environmental laws and regulations, according to Ma Jun, director of the nongovernmental Institute of Public & Environmental Affairs.
by Ling Li on November 30, 2006 China’s Ministry of Finance and the State Environmental Protection Administration (SEPA) have announced that starting in 2007, the nation’s central and provincial governments will prioritize their purchasing of environmentally friendly products and services.
by Ling Li on November 7, 2006 China’s investment in environmental protection is projected to grow faster than the county’s gross domestic product (GDP), according to Jun Ma, Greater China chief economist with Deutsche Bank. By 2010, “green” investments will account for 1.6 percent of Chinese GDP, or 1.9 trillion yuan (US$242 billion), growing at an average rate of 16 percent a year until then.
by Zijun Li on September 19, 2006 In its Asian Development Outlook 2006 Update, launched on September 6, the Asian Development Bank (ADB) revised upward its economic growth forecast for China for 2006, from 9.5 percent to 10.4 percent. The Bank also projected full-year growth for 2007 at 9.5 percent.
by Zijun Li on July 20, 2006 Amidst consistently high economic growth, a visible consumer culture is emerging in urban China.
by Zijun Li on June 29, 2006 Despite record-shattering economic growth rates and swift industrialization, a major jobs crisis is brewing in mainland China.
by Zijun Li on May 19, 2006 As Beijing moves forward with construction for the 2008 Summer Olympics, project developers are embracing state-of-the-art energy technologies as well as measures to save water and protect sensitive ecosystems.
by Zijun Li on May 9, 2006 The gap between the Chinese and global pharmaceutical sectors has widened in recent years
by Zijun Li on May 2, 2006 As China’s tourism industry flourishes, the country is poised to become the world’s second largest travel and tourism economy after the United States by 2015, according to a new report from the World Travel & Tourism Council (WTTC).
by Zijun Li on March 23, 2006 Starting April 1, Chinese consumers who buy cars with engine capacities of more than four liters will be required to pay a consumption tax of 20 percent.
by Zijun Li on February 24, 2006 Statistics from the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) indicate that China was the tenth biggest patent applicant in 2005, submitting 2,452 inventions, designs, and other items to the Geneva-based organization, reports China News.
by Yingling Liu on January 23, 2006 The Chinese electric utility Huaneng and the Spanish National Power Corporation Endesa have unveiled a pioneering initiative for purchasing emissions credits generated under the Kyoto Protocol's Clean Development Mechanism (CDM), according to the 21st Century Business Herald.
by Zijun Li on December 12, 2005 On December 7, Nanfang Weekend, a well-known Chinese newspaper, published a ranking of Fortune 500 companies' performance in China, revealing the poor records of the multinational corporations (MNCs) in tax payment, employee welfare, and environmental protection.
by Yingling Liu on December 1, 2005 China is the world's second largest emitter of carbon dioxide, and its new assertiveness on the issue leaves the United States, the world's largest emitter, even more isolated.
by Yingling Liu on November 9, 2005 China is expected to invest over 1,300 billion RMB (US $156.6 billion) in environmental protection between 2006 and 2010, more than 1.5 percent of the country’s GDP over this period, Xie Zhenhua, Director of China’s State Environmental Protection Administration (SEPA), said on Tuesday. Xie made the remark during a speech at the Woodrow Wilson Center for International Scholar's China Environment Forum.
by Yingling Liu on November 8, 2005 As China aims to double its sewage disposal capacity over the next five years, the demand for additional treatment facilities is expected to skyrocket. The Chinese government is extending an invitation to foreign investors to make up for the huge financial shortfall in the country's sewage treatment market.
by Yingling Liu on October 12, 2005 Over 70 percent of China's big cities, more than half of its population of 1.3 billion, and 75 percent of its key industrial and agricultural areas are located in regions prone to weather-related and geological disasters, according to Xinhua News Agency.
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Analysis
by Lila Buckley on September 18, 2007 One of the major barriers to the growth of civil society in China is the lack of funding to support a wide diversity of organizations and projects.
by Jiaquan Wang on March 27, 2007 Seemingly a winner in the global balance of trade, China is in fact struggling against an undercurrent of imported waste. The country, already laden with domestic pollution, is rapidly becoming the planet’s largest garbage dump, facing a huge influx of foreign garbage.
by Yun Feng on December 21, 2006 In Dongguan City in China’s southern Guangdong Province, you can buy a computer laptop for US$100. If you’ve got $200 in your wallet, you can acquire a second large machine, like a copier or fax. Yet even though products “made in China” are known for their low prices, the cheapest high-tech commodities here aren’t locally made. They actually come from the United States, Europe, and Japan, and are imported electronic waste, or “e-waste.”
by Yongfeng Feng on November 16, 2006 Talking just about environmental protection or culture, and not economic realities, will not launch local communities into development. Environmentalists are often accused of being “immoral”—hearing only the desperate cries of ecosystems and not seeing people’s daily struggles against poverty.
by Yongfeng Feng on November 14, 2006 In early September, Xiaoyi Liao, the president of Global Village Environmental Education Center in Beijing, went on a 20-day trip around southwest China’s Guizhou Province. Originally, she had hoped simply to enjoy the peace of the mountains while attending a local conference on village tourism development. But, she says, the situation in Guizhou “woke her up” to the need to take action.
by Jianqiang Liu on September 28, 2006 The Chinese government released its first “green” gross domestic product (GDP) report earlier this month, presenting an alternative to the nation’s current economic development path.
by Lila Buckley on September 5, 2006 Laojun Mountain has long been considered sacred to the Chinese minority groups who call it home. Flanking the foothills of the Himalaya in northwestern Yunnan province, the region contains more than 100 species of wild rhododendron, nearly 100 known mammal species, and over 150 distinct bird species. Many of these plants and animals are highly endangered, including two species of the Yunnan Golden Monkey, of which less than 1,500 exist in the wild.
by Yingling Liu on May 4, 2006 In recent years, environmentalists in China and elsewhere have expressed rising concern about the large quantities of electronic waste (“e-waste”) that wealthy countries continue to dump in the developing world, particularly in Asia.
by Zijun Li on February 22, 2006 European reaction to an ever-growing mountain of discarded cell phones, computers, televisions, MP3 players, and other electronics equipment has put companies in China and elsewhere in a scramble to respond.
by Zijun Li on December 23, 2005 A Beijing district court ruled that China's top Internet search provider, Baidu.com, infringed the copyrights of 34 recordings belonging to the Shanghai-based agency Push Sound and must pay US $10,000 dollars in compensation.
by Zijun Li on December 12, 2005 In the past month alone, China has suffered from two very serious human-caused disasters. Less then two weeks after a November 13 chemical plant explosion in Jilin province released a flood of toxins into the Songhua River, a blast at Dongfeng coal mine in the northeastern province of Heilongjiang killed 171 miners.
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