我看云贵川都有危险，海南更不用说了。

In my opinion Yunnan, Guizhou and Sichuan are all in danger, let alone Hainan.

而我们能做的却很少，现状是破坏的人多，保护的人少。当每个人在抱怨环境恶化的时候，是不是也可以建议他适当做点什么。
少吃不应季或产地遥远的水果，不知道能不能有点效果。

Environment is devastated at a quicker pace than we expected while what we can do is limited. People devastating environment outnumber those protecting it.While everyone is complaining degradation of environment,shall we also do something to protect it? I am wondering whether it helps that we eat more fruit which are in season and local.

拯救生态省

　　作者: 颜敏 　　
　　
　　
　　6月5日是世界环境日。被称为世界工厂的中国，尽管工业化远未完成，但环境的承载能力却已快到极限。及早应对环境难题，生态省或是其中一策。
　　
　　早在1983年，于光远就提出“把青海省建设成为一个生态省”，但并未成为现实，连生态省的说法也渐被淡忘。十多年前，海南经济泡沫破灭、特区前途未卜，九三学社颜家安和我提出建设生态省时，对此已毫不知情。海南首倡生态省至今，已有吉林、黑龙江等14个省(自治区、直辖市)开展生态省(自治区、直辖市)建设。
　　
　　生态省是中国改革开放的独创。它起源于地方自主权的扩大与自下而上的草根参与，以及对传统经济增长模式的反省。可惜，如今它正面临政府、市场和社会三个失灵，泡沫化已成迫在眉睫的危险。
　　究其根本，是我国环保制度存在基本缺陷。它使上级政府任务繁剧，尾大不掉，而基层政府、民众和企业又能力不足，在政府、市场和社会之间形成了一个“控制-依赖”的沉重套结。现在，急需几个重大制度的变革，冲开这个套结。
　　
　　【南方周末】本文网址：http://www.infzm.com/content/29505
　　
　　

Save the eco-provinces
Author: Yan Min
June 5 was “World Environment Day”. Widely deemed the world’s workshop, China is still a long way off finishing its industrialization, but its environment capacity has been strained to the limit. Perhaps building eco-province is one of the possible options for China to deal with its environmental problems.
As early as 1983 Yu Guangyuan proposed “building Qinghai Province into an eco-province”. Yet it was never put into action. With passage of time even the term “eco-province” itself passed into oblivion. Ten years ago when the economic bubble burst in Hainan Special Economic Zone, Yan Jiaan, a member of the Jiu San Society, and I jointly put forward the conception of building eco-province, we knew nothing of this part of history. Since then, the conception of eco-province has been adopted in 14 provinces, autonomous regions and municipalities such as Jilin and Heilongjiang. Eco-province was a unique creation in the process of China’s reform. It stemmed from the expansion of local governments’ volitional right and grassroot involvement as well as reflection on the downsides of traditional economic growth pattern.
Unfortunately, however, it is facing the malfunction of government, market and society, and the impending risk of foaming. The root cause lies with the fundamental flaws of the environmental protection mechanism in China, that is, the central government is overwhelmed with workload and duties, whereas governments at grass-root level, the populace and enterprises are incapable of dealing with their share of duties and work. Thus a knot of control-reliance comes into form among government, market and society. At this time a series of overhauls concerning the administrative structure are needed to untie the gordian knot.
An excerpt from Southern China Weekend
Link: http://www.infzm.com/content/29505

（本文由杨宾翻译）

重划中央与地方的资源权限

“生态省”以省为单位进行环境治理保护，本是扭转“点上治理、面上破坏、整体恶化”趋势的战略思路。但现在，生态的整体性依然与条块分割的行政管理模式尖锐冲突。

看左右：政府部门间权责不清，经常发生利益冲突。可以收费、发放许可证、分派项目的实权成为争相认领的“热区”，无利可图的事却成为互相推诿的“冷区”。

再看上下：分税制以来，中央财政预算内收入急剧上升，其支出比重却不断下降。如今，中央财政预算内收入比重达到50%-60%，但承担的环境保护支出为20%-30%。这种收支比例，与中央支持生态省建设的意图背道而驰。

而省、市又集中了地方最主要的财力、物力、人力及权力，作为生态建设环境保护的基层主体，县、乡、镇、街道、村，却普遍财政困难，可支配的环保资源匮乏。许多地方划出生态保护区，但除了国家、省级保护区有一定经费支持外，各个县级保护区基本上没有任何经费投入，所谓保护也就只能挂一块牌牌。

另外，立法权高度集中，地方立法创新缺乏必要空间。我国各地自然生态条件和经济社会条件差异很大，但现行环保法律法规是面向全国的，不能充分考虑各地的实际情况，并且很多内容相当陈旧，缺乏操作性，有的措施非常软弱。例如，据立法法，诉讼和仲裁制度由国家立法，地方没有权力立法，这对生态省推动公益诉讼是一个很大的障碍。

可以让生态省率先探索资源体制的重大改革，重拟中央与地方的资源权利。譬如海南拥有全国最大的海洋面积，应部分拥有南海石油[0.05 -1.89%]、天然气的开采权，获得必要的经济支持。这就必须改革现行规定，扩展地方对石油天然气的开采权限。

此外，还应继续调整1994年形成的分税制。增加地方财政预算内的收入，同时削减其预算外收支，把生态省建设列为预算内优先支出项目。地方各层级间的分税，也应继续调整，把财力、物力等尽量向下级政府转移。环保支出有了财政制度的保障，且置于公众的监督之下，就可以大幅削减项目收费，堵死创收行为，进而解决部门利益冲突导致的政府环保效率低下。

Readjust the access to resources of central and local government

“Ecological Province”, undertaking the environmental governance and protection in the unit of province, is a strategy to reverse the trend of “protecting the micro, damaging the macro and overall deteriorating”. But now the ecological integrity remains acute conflict with the highly fragmented administration model. Between the administrations, the responsibility and authority is not clear, which often causes conflict of interests. The authorities of firing, licensing, and dispatching items are scrambling as hot cake, while unprofitable things are snubbing as hot potatoes.

Between the central and local government, since the system of tax distribution is launched, revenue above the central budget has increased sharply while the output decrease constantly. Nowadays, proportion of central budget revenue reaches 50%-60%, but proportion of the environmental protection expenditure is 20% -30%. The proportion of such income and expenditure is opposed to the central support for the intention to build ecological provinces.

However, the provinces, municipalities possess most financial and material resources, manpower and authorities. But as the grass-roots of ecological construction and environmental protection, most of counties, villages, towns, residential districts are in financial difficulties and lack of environmental resources. Many locals have set up ecological areas. But except for some national and provincial funding for protected areas, the areas at county level almost devote no funding. The so called protection will only be linked to a piece of card.

In addition, the highly concentration of legislation power makes locals are lack of legislation innovating space. Though the ecological conditions and economical conditions differs greatly from different parts in our country, the existing environmental protection laws and regulations are for the whole country, which cannot be fully taken into account the actual situation around; much of the content is old, infeasible and some measures are very weak. For example, according to legislation law, procedural regime and arbitration system is decided by the central, locals have no authorities to make legislation. This is a big obstacle to ecological provinces pushing forward public interest litigation.

We can let the ecological provinces explore major breakthroughs of resource system and readjust the access to resources of central and local government. For example, as Han Nan Province has the biggest ocean area in nation, it should have a part of the authorities of Nanhai Oil [0.05 -1.89%], exploiting natural gas; and get necessary financial support. To realize this needs to reform current reputation and extend local authorities of exploiting oil and natural gas.

Besides, we needs to continue to adjust tax distribution system formed in 1994; increase local budgetary financial revenue and meanwhile extra-budgetary revenue and expenditure; put building ecological province into priority expenditures projects on-budget. The distribution of tax between all local levels should continue to be regulated, to transfer the financial power and material power to lower level governments as much as possible. Expenditure on environmental protection, guaranteed by fiscal system and supervised by public, will dramatically cut item charges, prevent misfeasance of generating profits, in turn solve the inefficiency on government’s environmental protection caused by departmental conflicts of interest.
Translated by Zhang Liang.

资金严重不足，能不能靠市场？可惜，至今中国的环保市场根本没有建立。现行的环境法律法规，主要强调命令加控制。环境保护法除了第6条直接涉及市场主体权利，从第40、41条中可推定市场主体的权利外，其他都是对环境行政机关管理权力的设定。

在这种制度下，生态省建设的投入主要由政府承担，环保产业一直是垄断产业。管理干部吃皇粮，设备维修运行费用吃补贴。城市生活污水处理、生活垃圾处理是最有条件实现社会化服务的领域，也由市政部门垄断。各地的环保公司，大多由各级环保局操办，又在本局管辖的范围内，承接环保工程的设计、施工、设备制造等业务。这种“环保腐败”，已成为环境污染的重要源头。

大气污染防治法规定：对污染大气的单位和个人，由县级以上政府主管部门处理。然而，由于政企不分，环保执法极难。就像亲娘打崽，多半不会动真格。有的污染大户负责人，就是该地政府、人大或政协的负责人，环保执法部门自然人微言轻。1999年，朱镕基曾指出，排污收费难，是因为许多国企拿银行贷款去交排污费，“一个是我左边口袋的钱，一个是我右边口袋的钱”。更有甚者，有些地区，尽管某类企业可能对生态环境造成严重损害，公众也极力反对，只因对当地GDP贡献大，政府就为之大开绿灯，极力引进。于是，企业也不把自己当成环境保护的主体，而把责任推给政府。这样，环保市场自属奢谈。

解决市场失灵，政府需放弃环保产业垄断，政企分开。明晰资源要素价格、所有权，以内化企业的负外部性和环境风险，避免“公地悲剧”。然后才能建立资源要素市场，使价格信号充分反映供求关系、资源稀缺程度、环境损害和治理成本等。目前，我国特别需要公开企业环保信息、减少各类能源产品等的补贴，为实行排污收费制度、许可证交易制度创造条件。

当然了，改变“权利往上揽，责任往下推”的弊端，釜底抽薪的做法，是把对资源的直接控制权，放到民众和社会手里。

Can we depend on the environmental market if we scarcely have enough capital? It is a pity that the environmental market has not been set up in China yet. The current environmental laws and regulations mainly focus on orders dissemination and management. As for the Environmental Protection Law, apart from Article 6 which directly concerns about the market’s rights, and Article 40 & 41 that imply the rights enjoyed by the market, the rest only state the management authority over the environmental administrative bodies.

This mechanism means that, the environmental industry has always been a monopoly as the governments are responsible for establishing the ecological provinces. Government officers depend on national stipends, while allowances are given to the maintenance of facilities and operation. The urban governmental bodies also monopolize the management of daily sewage and waste disposal which could otherwise be run by local organizations. Most of the local environmental organizations are concurrently run and monitored by the environmental bureaus. They are responsible for the design and construction of environmental projects as well as the building of facilities. This kind of "environmental corruption" is the main source of environmental pollution.

The "Law of the People's Republic of China on the Prevention and Control of Atmospheric Pollution" stipulates that any people or organizations that deal with atmospheric pollution shall be managed by the responsible units of above-county-level governments. Yet, law execution is extremely difficult as enterprises are not independent from the governments. It is similar to the Chinese saying, "mothers never beat up their children with full strength". The environmental execution bodies are inferior and fail to make changes as the local governments, the National People's Congress and People's Political Consultative Conference stand as the responsible entities for polluting giant companies. In 1999, Zhu Rongji (the ex-Premier of PRC) pointed out the difficulty of charging sewage cost is due to the fact that many national enterprises pay sewage fees by bank loans. "It is still the same sum of money except that part of it is in our left pocket while another is in our right pocket”, he said. What’s more, in certain districts, even some kind of industries may largely damage the ecological environment and intense objection is voiced by the general public, the local government would approve them simply because of the great contribution to the local GDP. Therefore, enterprises would shift the responsibilities to the governments, rather than seeing themselves as the chief driver for environmental protection. The environmental market is thus no more than ideals.

To deal with the failure of market mechanism, the governments need to eliminate industrial monopoly and become independent from the enterprises. “The tragedy of the commons” can be avoided, when the negative externalities and the environmental risks are internalized as prices and ownership of the resource elements are clearly defined. Then, the market of resource elements can be created so that price levels can reflect the demand-supply relationship, the scarcity of resources, the damage on the environment and the induced cost of governance. To implement the system of sewage charge and to allow the system of license transaction, China is especially in need of publicizing the environmental messages and reducing the allowances for the energy-using products at the time being.

Of course, to remove the ultimate cause of problem, the counter-action against the malpractice of “concentrating authority and forgoing responsibilities” is to allow the public and the society to obtain the rights of direct management of resources.

中国公众对环境并非漠不关心，一旦权益遭到损害，也想讨个说法。1997年刑法即添加了环境污染罪，但直到2007年，全国以“破坏环境罪”定案的，只有三起。2002年，全国人大常委会通过环境影响评价法，这本应成为一部保障公众参与环保的法，然而，这部法律被删除了重要内容，剩下的条文过于笼统，可操作性不强，公众参与范围窄。在法律条文的适用、诉讼主体资格、立案、诉讼费用、举证责任、判决执行等几乎所有方面，为环境诉讼设立了种种门槛。这些类似于“第二十二条军规”的环境法案，直接造成中国公民的环保行动能力十分有限，环境意识呈现严重的“政府依赖型”。

在这种制度环境中，生态省就只是政府甚至环保部门内部的运动。一般做法是，由省市领导召开政府动员大会，提出目标，由环境部门委托环境科研机构制定规划，再征求其它部门意见，最后报当地人大通过。从生态省规划到建设项目，都被政府各有关部门牢牢掌控，整个决策过程中都没有公众、企业或公益组织的参与。即使有一些提倡公众参与的内容，但都没有实际可行的措施，多强调公众的环保责任，而不是环境权利。

另外一个病象是，多数生态省规划，无论是计划、项目和资金安排，都表现出严重的城市中心主义。疏理城市河道、平整道路、改造旧街区、种树种草种花，在一定程度上，生态省建设成美化城市的运动。甚至为了城市绿化，从野外和农村把大树古树移到城市中来，人称“绿化转移”。有些地方搞生态省建设，退耕还林影响到上百万户贫困农户的生计，但中央财政转移支付到了地方，却很少惠及到他们。这种生态省建设，民众为什么支持？

解决的办法之一，是尽快拆除为环境诉讼设立的种种门槛，发展公益诉讼制度，鼓励每个公民为身边的环境问题，提起诉讼。为扭转环境恶化的严峻趋势，应把原告资格扩展到任何与案件有直接或间接利害关系的公民、法人和其他组织，特别需要明确与案件没有切身利益关系的各类公益团体的“公共利益代表人”的诉讼资格，以集中分散的资源，争取个体力量无法争取的权益，提高诉讼效率，节约司法资源。由于环境问题技术复杂、调查取证昂贵，在鼓励发展独立的监测、鉴定机构外，应适当改变“谁主张谁举证”的原则，推行举证责任倒置的制度，让污染者、破坏者承当举证责任。

为此，应鼓励社会环保组织的健康发展。现行社会团体登记管理条例规定，成立社会团体须经“业务主管单位”审查同意，在同一行政区域内不得有“已有业务范围相同或者相似的社会团体”，这些规定严重阻碍了环保社团的发展。应尽快修订社团法规条例，撤销这些限制，支持、鼓励和保护环保志愿者的活动，让他们成为社会环保的骨干力量。

The general public in China is not indifferent to environmental issues. They would have their own opinions if their rights were being infringed. The Environmental Pollution Law was added in 1997 however, by 2007 there were only 3 cases of infringment of this law. In 2002, the Standing Committee of the National People’s Congress approved the Environmental Impact Assessment Law which should secure a channel of public participation in environmental protection. Yet, a crucial part has been removed from the law, leaving behind only abstract terms. The execution of the law is undermined and the scope for public participation has been narrowed. Various barriers against environmental lawsuits have been formed in terms of the relevance of the law, the qualification and fees of lawsuits, the filing of investigation and prosecution, the burden of proof, the execution of judgment, etc. Such environmental bills are similar to a "Catch-22", which means that people have limited power in initiating environmental actions, which thus results in a highly "government-dependent" environmental mentality. In this situation, the environmental provinces are merely an internal movement within the government and its environmental protection bodies. The usual practice is, the county and city governments would call for a mobilisation meeting in which objectives can be concluded. The environmental R & D organisations would then be authorised by the governments' environmental bodies to plan for ways to attain the objectives. The plans would be submitted for approval by the local National People's Congress after comments are sought from the other governmental departments. Respective governmental bodies closely control aspects ranging from the planning of ecological provinces to the construction projects. The whole decision process does not involve any participation from the public, enterprises and public organisations. Even for those discussions that promote public participation, no practical measures could be provided. Instead of the public's rights of environmental protection, most of the discussions emphasise their responsibilities. Another problem is that, most ecological provinces planning is extremely city-centred, from the planning to the projects and the allocation of capital. To a certain extent, the ecological provinces have become an city beautification campaign, as seen from the drainage of urban rivers, road maintenance, renewal of old districts, tree planting and gardening. Even old giant trees are relocated from the countryside and rural areas to the cities, which is merely for the sake of greening the city. This is called the “greening transfer”. The returning farmland to forest policy, which is in line with the building of ecological provinces, is threatening the livelihood of millions of poor families. These families are rarely aided by the central government's financial transfer when it reaches the local governments. Why would the public support the building of such ecological provinces? One of the solutions is to immediately eliminate all barriers against environmental lawsuits and to develop a system of public lawsuit, so that each citizen can be encouraged to put forward a lawsuit in the face of the surrounding environmental problems. To change the course of the deteriorating environment, the prosecuting rights shall be extended to cover any citizen, corporation or organisation that has direct or indirect interests in the legal case. Such rights shall be specifically defined for the “representatives of public interests” who belong to public organisations, even their personal interests are not involved in the cases. In this way, the scattered resources can then be centralised, the rights can be secured which otherwise is impossible with individual effort, the efficiency of lawsuits can be improved and legal resources can be taken care of. As the techniques in tackling environmental problems are complex, while the costs of investigation and evidents remain high, apart from encouraging the development of independent monitoring and identification organisations, the principle of “the burden of prosecution and proof” shall be amended so that the current direction of the burden of proof can be reversed and the polluters are liable for providing proofs. Therefore, the normal development of public environmental protection organisations can be supported. As stipulated by the Registration of Social Organisations Ordinance, the establishment of public organizations shall be assessed and approved by the “responsible units for the business”, and not more than one public organisation in “the same or similar field of business” shall exist in the same administrative district. Such regulations greatly hinder the development of environmental protection organizations. The terms and regulations of public organisations shall thus be immediately amended so that such restrictions shall be discarded. We shall also support the activities initiated by the volunteers of environmental protection groups, for they will become the hardcore supporters of environmental protection in the society.

另外，在国家产权和市场产权的过渡地带，还可建立第三种产权——社会产权制度。为解决国有资源产权虚置失控和私人产权负外部性的弊端，可以对自然环境资源的所有权、管理权、处置权、收益权作适当的分离。在政府和社会严格监督的前提下，把一些环境资源产权有条件地转移给直接利益相关者进行经营管理，也可以对一些环境保护、生态建设的事务进行项目化处理，以委托经营、购买服务、补贴服务等方式，与社区组织、志愿组织、基金会、协会等各类非盈利机构合作开展环境保护。

如此，生态省建设才可能由国家自上而下发动的“空战”，转变为社会自下而上的持久行动，接上“地气”。

(作者为中南大学教师)

Besides, another property--community property system--can be established in the transition zone of the state property and the market property. In order to solve problems such as losing control of national properties of resources and the external defects of private properties, appropriate separation can be made among the ownership, management, disposition and usufruct of natural resources. Also, on the premise of the strict governmental and social supervision, some environmental properties can be transferred to direct stakeholders under certain conditions; or, we can projectise some practices of environmental protection and ecological construction, cooperating with communities, voluntary organisations, foundations, associations or other non-profit organisations through entrusted management, buying service and subsidies. In this way, can the construction of a ecological province be sustainable action initiated from the society rather than being executed by the central government.

--written by a professor at Central South University