Latest Articles by Tang Hao

Waste exports: the underside of globalisation

Hao Tang — Mon, 12 Feb 2007 17:18:00 +0000

Many claim the global trash trade exposes the west's hypocrisy. But are countries to blame - or companies? Governments, businesses and the public must all play a role in managing the environment, says Tang Hao.

Sky TV recently reported that the world's largest container ship, the Emma Maersk, had arrived in south China’s Lianjiao, laden with 170,000 tonnes of rubbish. The local economy has relied on waste recycling for years. As a result, fumes can be seen pouring out of Lianjiao’s chimneys, its rivers are blackened, its soil is contaminated, its water is polluted and trash can be seen piled up like mountains. The story has ignited controversy in both the UK and China.

But this is not a new phenomenon. Western nations started exporting waste to developing countries as early as the 1960s and ‘70s, with disastrous consequences. In August 2006, a boat chartered by a Netherlands-based firm dumped hundreds of tonnes of toxic waste in the Ivory Coast, killing seven and hospitalising 24, with almost 40,000 people suffering to some degree.

The overwhelming opinion of online commentators is that this demonstrated how western countries adhere to double standards with regard to the environment. But waste dumping is not carried out by nations: it is carried out by corporations.

Exporting trash has allowed firms to earn money from governments in the developed world, cutting government costs and avoiding local regulations, while the exporters earn an additional income from selling the rubbish. At the same time, developing countries get a source of raw materials. China is the world's second largest consumer of plastic; one tonne of synthetic resin costs 11,000 yuan (around US$1,420), but a tonne of imported plastic, discarded in the west, can be bought for as little as 4,000 yuan (around US$515). The work of sorting the waste is hard and dirty, but for many it is more lucrative than the alternative. “We’re poor, so we still have to,” explained one interviewee. “If we plant crops, we can only earn around 2,000 yuan (around US$260) every year. But this work pays much more quickly: as much as 800 yuan (around US$100) every month.”

When there is this kind of profit to be made, there will always be someone willing to risk others’ health by importing trash, and many more who will endanger their own to sort it: it is simple economics.

Or is it? If the UK had weaker environmental laws, money could be made processing waste there, and nobody would export rubbish to China. Trash ends up in China because developed countries have more robust green laws, greater social supervision and more effective governments; high fees associated with waste processing and pollution emissions have made it uneconomical to process the trash locally.

But the low cost of waste processing and the large profits to be made in China make it a lucrative industry. Meanwhile, government oversight is weak and punishment is mainly in the form of fines that go directly to government rather than compensating the victims of pollution. As a result, companies and individuals involved can keep on polluting.

Globalisation benefits both developed and developing nations, but environmental laws and their enforcement are weaker in poorer countries. This gives richer nations a chance to export their waste and pollution. The economic and environmental differences are, in essence, the result of underdeveloped systems.

Globalisation increases the interaction between different systems, and exposes the gaps between them. In the same way that less-developed systems attract unregulated and risky investments, they also attract waste.

Governments, businesses and the international community should make a sustained effort to prevent the continuation and expansion of this serious problem.

International agreements that invoke the authority of a third party should be implemented. Sponsored by the United Nations or global environmental groups, such agreements would reduce the potential for harm to developing countries. The third party should also be able to help with the costs of environmental protection.

It is also important to control those factors that allow this unregulated trade. In this particular case, the UK government should bear responsibility for not implementing international agreements, take its rubbish back and discuss more effective systems for managing the international flow of solid waste with the Chinese government. Similarly, China should increase the cost of waste production and waste imports to reduce the price differentials: only this can get to the root of the problem. Otherwise, this issue will become intractable, and more problems will arise.

The Chinese government recognises the harm caused, and a law on solid waste is being rushed through the legislative process. Laws and regulations should be enough to improve the management of imported waste and reduce its environmental harm. But many have concerns about their effectiveness; waste processing and plastics are still highly lucrative industries, and the companies at the heart of the industry may just relocate.

The most basic and important measure is to build the public into the new systems. In the west, it is social pressure that blocks interest groups, keeps the government in line and pushes for strict environmental policies. Public movements inspired by environmental disasters in the 1960s and ‘70s led to a solid environmental protection system and a tradition of public oversight of the environment.

NGOs such as Greenpeace, the media, strict laws and responsible local governments must all play a part in helping China's environment to ensure that situations like this do not continue to arise.

Tang Hao is a Guangzhou-based academic and commentator

Weathering the storm

Hao Tang — Thu, 10 May 2007 15:50:00 +0000

China still averages one environmental accident every two days, despite a number of high-profile crackdowns on polluters. A stronger movement is needed to take on a dangerous alliance of money and power, writes Tang Hao.

China’s State Environmental Protection Administration (SEPA) has launched three major crackdowns known as “environmental storms” in the past three years. The first one, in the early part of 2005 halted 30 unapproved construction projects, and 56 projects were not approved in 2006. Regional permit restrictions were used to block four major energy projects this year; 82 other projects have also been criticised for falling foul of the rules on environmental impact assessments. But despite the continued crackdowns, China has faced more and more environmental problems. Over the same period, the number of environmental disasters has increased, with one pollution incident occurring every two days on average. Public complaints about environmental concerns have increased 30% and central leadership statements on the subject have increased 52%. Moreover, pollution emissions continued to rise in 2006. SEPA's high hopes for the success of the environmental storms have not been realised.

How can this be the case, with rising concerns from the public and the media, not to mention SEPA’s repeated statements? Why is it so hard to put effective measures in place – and make local governments and businesses fall into line? Understanding the answers to these questions requires taking a broader view, which reveals the rise of an anti-environmental interest group – of which local governments are only one part – who want to take an active role in environmental decision-making. And at the same time, this wider view exposes a void at the heart of China's environmental movement.

A clash of interests

Pan Yue, SEPA’s deputy director, believes that the government must take ultimate responsibility for the country’s environmental crisis. But he also agrees that the environmental protection movement suffers from an over-reliance on government. Only the government can enforce environmental impact assessments, supervise projects and punish polluters. But for local governments, economic growth is of overriding importance, and the environment is often sacrificed as a result. SEPA figures show that environmental impact assessments are carried out for only 40% of city-level projects, and at the county-level this dwindles sharply to 20%. Asking local governments, who profit from such projects, to take environmental concerns into account in effect requires them to act against their own interests.

Anti-environmental interests are also represented by business. Inadequate legal enforcement in energy-saving and environmental protection allows domestic firms to profit from polluting their environment, while transnational companies relocate their waste and polluting industries to China. Local media, beholden to the rich and powerful, fail to speak out. Special interest groups have thus formed an unspoken alliance against the environment.

When compared with their powerful, united opponents, China's environmental groups seem weak and diffuse. Social forces: international and domestic non-governmental organisations (NGOs), civil-society organisations, the media and the public, have been slow to develop. Take environmental NGOs as an example: regulations require them to have a “sponsoring organisation” before they can register, weakening the NGO sector. If Friends of Nature’s sponsor were to withdraw its support, for example, the organisation’s legality – and its very existence – would come under threat. The growth of environmental NGOs is also held back by internal problems that include a lack of skilled personnel, poor standards of accounting and low credibility in the eyes of the public. The limitations of the NGO sector, combined with government ineffectiveness in environmental protection, hinder the progress of China’s environmental movement. At the end of last year there were around 3,000 environmental organisations in the country, but we need far more.

Environmental protection requires society’s concern and participation. But contemporary China has been unable to rise to this challenge, and the storms whipped up by government have had little effect at a grassroots level. Once the storm has passed, everything returns to normal – or even gets worse.

Civil society

The only way to counteract the hold of the anti-environmental lobby is to help environmentally-aware citizens work together and turn public opinion into organised and sustained pressure. Environmental groups, the media, local government and environmental authorities should all be able to compete for influence. The experience of countries that have highly-developed interest groups, such as the US, demonstrates that organisations working for the public good are the best way to rein in the influence of special interest groups.

The crisis facing China’s environmental protection movement is caused by a combination of its own weakness and the power of its opponents. If the environmental storms are to be effective, the balance of power needs to be put right. The government has an important role to play, but should not be relied upon too much. More important work will take place in the social sphere.

A framework for setting up and developing environmental and public-interest organisations should be put in place. Public opinion should call for new legislation to make sure NGOs can take part in the environmental debate. Only organised social forces will be able to take on local government-supported anti-environmentalism.

NGOs should also work harder at being autonomous, training their staff in cooperation with higher education institutions and improving their accountability, evaluation, participation and regulation mechanisms to improve their public credibility. They should strengthen their links with government and push for a relatively independent system of NGO management, which will foster a positive, relationship of trust between NGOs and government. This will also be achieved through regular dialogue between environmental NGOs and the environment authorities, as well as through government’s willingness to monitor, manage and serve NGOs and the public interests they seek to represent.

Non-Chinese environmental organisations should take the country's circumstances into account when assisting local groups. Entrusting projects to local organisations is one way to help. Another is to establish contacts with official organisations and to campaign for multinationals to make environmentally-sound investments. Chinese environment protection can also seek overseas funding.

The weakness of China’s NGOs and the media’s relative silence on environmental issues exposes a lack of public participation. And it is the public who suffer most. The solution must be based on ensuring the public's right to be informed, to participate, to speak out and to supervise. Environmental impact assessments should be improved to allow public participation and increase the depth and detailed nature of the process. Public opinion, expressed through the media and public hearings, should inform government environmental decision-making. Only a positive interaction between the public and the government will allow the environmental storms to be effective at a grassroots level, and be more than just environmental rhetoric.

Tang Hao, born in 1974, is a newspaper columnist and assistant professor of politics at Huanan Normal University. His essays and opinion pieces have appeared in Contemporary International Relations, International Studies, Nanfang Daily, Yangcheng Evening News, Southern Window,and many other publications.

Homepage photo by Alex Vinter

Protecting the environment in a globalised era

Hao Tang — Wed, 06 Jun 2007 14:28:00 +0000

The G8 leaders meeting in Germany will need to address a range of international environmental issues this week. But do they have the power to act, asks Tang Hao, or does business have the upper hand?

Rachael Carson’s book, Silent Spring, makes clear how difficult it was in the US to put bans or restrictions on the use of pesticides, despite widespread public awareness about their harmful effects. This was largely because politicians with close links to industry conspired to prevent environmental laws reaching the statute books. Former US vice-president Al Gore once remarked: “It is astonishing to see the cosseting [the pesticide] industry has been accorded in Congress over the years. The statute that regulates pesticides, fungicides, and rodenticides sets far looser standards than those that regulate food and drugs, and Congress intentionally made them more difficult to enforce.”

In response to this conflict of interests, Carson felt that the environmental struggle would only be successful when it became political. But in her era, environmental politics could remain at a national level. Today we face more complex and international environmental issues. It can be seen easily how some large corporations – whose interests stretch far beyond any one country -- have used their economic strength to buy political influence that will limit environmental protection. For instance, when a company builds its polluting factories overseas, it becomes even harder for any one country to control. Globalisation has given multinational corporations unprecedented economic and political power, and allowed them to become global monopolies.

Economic globalisation’s most important effect on the environment has been the rise of transnational interest groups who can ignore domestic and international environmental regulations for the sake of profits. The harm they do is far harder to mitigate than that of any national entity; politicians can make statements, NGOs can set up campaigns and the public can call for change, but these groups remain the main reason for our worsening environmental situation.

Powerless

These obstacles and vested interests have always existed, but they have been enhanced in the transnational era. Even the most developed of countries are powerless to control them, and some even become partners in their anti-environmental strategies. Global politics increasingly becomes about keeping these interests on-side.

Governments find themselves unable to act on an ever-increasing range of environmental issues, something that the G8 leaders meeting at the summit in Heiligendamm this week will be keenly aware of. The reason is simple: when a corporation’s operations are restricted to one country, the government can act directly on the company. However, when companies are multinational and strengthened by globalisation, a single government can do little. This is particularly the case in the developing world, where governments are often unable to act, or are even unaware of the true situation.

Democratic governments are more concerned about what happens within their own borders – where their voters live -- than on the international stage. When the economy alone is globalised, the multinationals gain the economic and political advantage, and even their “home” countries are helpless. In the worst cases, governments become accomplices. At the G8 summit in 2005, the US attempted to ensure that the meeting’s report did not contain any mention of global warming and its effects. This act of climate-change denial was the ideal excuse for the US withdrawal from and subsequent failure to ratify the Kyoto Protocol. These differences remained at a meeting of G8 environment ministers in Potsdam, where the US remained unwilling to contribute funds for climate-protection measures in developing countries or to implement the emissions reductions called for in the Kyoto Protocol.

However, this is not to say that the politicians have all forgotten their responsibilities. We have seen politicians such as Bill Clinton, Al Gore, Jimmy Carter and many more establish environmental initiatives after leaving office, demonstrating their concern for the environment. But while in office they cannot achieve their aims due to corporate pressure. Only when they leave their positions of power are they able to act as concerned citizens. And while this deserves our respect, we cannot help but ask why they were not able to do more while in office.

People and governments

It is clear that if the environment is left in the hand of minority interest groups and the needs of humanity are not taken into account, environmental crises will only increase. The UK Met Office says that climate change, combined with the El Niño phenomenon, means global temperatures in 2007 will be the highest on record. UN predictions see temperatures rising by 1.5 to 6 degrees Celsius over the next century, affecting hundreds of millions.

It was the public that launched the environmental movement, but now it is led by traditional domestic politics, as well as environmental groups and beneficiaries (especially in the developed world). When 12 US states, along with several cities and NGOs won their court case against the Environmental Protection Agency and the US car industry in April, it required carbon dioxide to be viewed as a pollutant and regulated under the Clean Air Act. Environmentalists cheered the decision, but in comparison with the power of free-flowing global capital, the environmental movement still has a long way to go. Environmental NGOs are still unwelcome and restricted in many countries, and while economies may be globalised, politics and culture are often not.

Environmental protection is much less globalised than economic activity, and this will not be rectified by intergovernmental dialogue alone. The leaders of developed countries should be aware of their responsibilities as the heads of powerful democracies. Environmentally-aware citizens should widen their horizons, banding together to work on a broader scale; they should participate in civil society to pressure government and business, and press for stricter international environmental laws and harsher punishments for those who harm the planet. Attempts to play down the problems become steadily more useless as the crisis escalates. We can only succeed in environmental protection when global markets, international civil society and world governments play balanced roles.

Tang Hao, born in 1974, is a newspaper columnist and assistant professor of politics at Huanan Normal University. His essays and opinion pieces have appeared in Contemporary International Relations, International Studies, Nanfang Daily, Yangcheng Evening News, Southern Window,and many other publications.

Cleaning China's polluted Pearl

Hao Tang — Thu, 28 Jun 2007 17:51:00 +0000

The harmful effects of rapid urbanisation and industrial growth have been felt on the Pearl River delta, writes Tang Hao. While the worst pollution has been controlled in recent years, he argues, prevention is always better than cure.

Cities grow around water; almost every urban settlement relies on a river, a lake or a sea for its life. But water is not just necessary for survival; it becomes part of a city’s culture and its soul. Take the water away, and the spirit of the city will often be lost.

Before the 1980s, south China’s Pearl River delta was known for its lakes and rivers. The city of Guangzhou was famous for its six waterways that divided the city. Only three decades ago its residents would go swimming in the Pearl River, or watch dragon-boat races from its banks. Further upriver, Foshan enjoyed over 5,000 kilometres of waterways. People lived by the Pearl River – and on the river – as boats plied its length.

But after decades of industrial development and urbanisation, China’s cities are becoming ever thirstier for water. Pollution is worsening, and people are becoming separated from the water that their city drinks. The Pearl River is known as Guangzhou’s “mother river,” but the city’s people are tragically estranged from their mother. And they have only their irresponsibility and greed to blame.

Guangdong is the most developed province in the Pearl River basin, and it is responsible for most of the region’s pollution. China’s system of environmental standards classify water quality with a series of benchmarks, with “class one” the cleanest and “class five” the dirtiest. In 2004, water flowing into Guangdong was of a “class three” quality, but it was a “class five” – or even below – when it reached the Pearl River delta. Quality was worst of all in Guangzhou. It was “class four” for seven months in 2005, but from January to March that year it was below “class five” the entire time, meaning it was very seriously polluted. “Class four” water is not supposed to ever come into direct contact with the human body. Water must be of “class three” or higher before swimming is permissible. Locals could only dream of taking a dip in the Pearl River. Not only were traces of life steadily disappearing from the river, but the water was also black, oily and malodorous. This all-important artery was dying, and many sections were concreted over. Years of pollution turned the Pearl River and its tributaries into dark and stinking sewers.

As if that was not bad enough, polluted rivers also spread disease. For instance, the pollution of London’s River Thames reached its worst point in the 1850s, when the local population suffered cholera outbreaks. As of June 20 this year, Guangzhou had two confirmed cases of cholera, which were traced to local river products, such as fish, crab and shrimp. Such cases are rare in Guangzhou, and in China, yet they have reappeared after all these years of economic growth.

Cleaning up

Guangzhou started trying to clean up the Pearl River in 2005. Key methods included water treatment, improving the pipe network, removing silt, adding clean water and stopping pollution. The construction of a number of large water-treatment plants did result in some improvements, and massive investment in treatment is still the main cleanup strategy. The city invested 25.4 billion yuan ($US3.3 billion) in new treatment plants last year, and is now able to treat an extra 635,000 tonnes of water every day.

However, if we distinguish between “pre-emptive” and “after-the-fact” methods of dealing with water pollution, there is little doubt that the best method is to deal with the source of the problem: forcing factories to make changes or to close down. Now we only try to solve the problem after it has appeared – we pollute first, and clean up later. It is not only Guangzhou, of course, that has made this choice. It is very common to see efforts concentrated on cleanup, rather than prevention. Foshan invested 10.2 billion yuan last year in cleaning up over 1,000 kilometres of its waterways, yet little progress was made on reducing effluent from big polluters.

These conflicting cleanup methods reflect the wider contestation between different interest groups in Chinese society. Treatment, rather than prevention, tends to win the battle because building sanitation plants presents no threat to the polluters. Local government see quick results, and it is less problematic than closing down factories. The only problem is that the taxpayers have to foot the bill. So the public bear the cost, even though they suffer most from pollution.

Prevention

Guangzhou has put a lot of effort into controlling pollution with water-treatment plants, river cleanups and treatment of industrial effluent. The provincial governor and city mayor even went so far as to swim in the Pearl River to demonstrate their success and determination. But the construction of ever more treatment plants fails to solve the problem at its root. Aside from the greater costs compared to prevention, it is also far less effective. The treated water will reach “class three” at most. Despite the testing stations along the river, which report greatly increased water quality, anyone walking along the Pearl River will be struck by the stench and the rubbish that litters its banks. The water quality fluctuates, and we have to wonder how effective the treatment actually is.

Pollution in the Pearl River cannot be blamed entirely on Guangzhou. Most of the cities in the delta contribute to the problem. And even if Guangzhou would make its water crystal clear, it would not make any difference in cities upstream. But cleaning up the river requires a comprehensive approach: it’s not just a matter of treating the water. I funded a survey of the river with some friends last year. We found that in recent years, numerous dams have been built to reduce the risk of floods and to generate power, but these also worsen the pollution. The dams slow the flow of water and reduce the river’s ability to purify itself. This could, in fact, neutralise the benefits of water treatment.

Investment in water-treatment plants does work for Guangzhou, of course; the improvement in local water quality cannot be denied. But there should be a wider range of choices, or the water will simply continue to worsen as the sources of pollution increase. The number of water-treatment plants will never keep up with industrial growth; pollution will always be one step ahead of treatment. To truly solve the problem we cannot rely on building more water treatment plants or on moving the factories to other rivers. We need to change the way we approach our water resources, their exploitation and pollution. This will be a hard and thankless task, but it is not a task we can avoid. We need increased government oversight, with strict controls on waste discharges and the closure of polluting factories. We need to encourage companies to treat their own waste, and bear their responsibility to wider society. We need to mobilise the public to monitor pollution and get involved in stopping it themselves. And besides this, we must develop a more environmentally-friendly economy and bring local industry into the future. This is the long-term solution to the problem of China's polluted rivers.

Tang Hao, born in 1974, is a newspaper columnist, deputy editor of Shimin (Citizen) magazine, and assistant professor of politics at Huanan Normal University. His essays and opinion pieces have appeared in Contemporary International Relations, International Studies, Nanfang Daily, Yangcheng Evening News, Southern Window and many other publications.

Homepage photo by Steven Schroeder

How government waste threatens conservation

Hao Tang — Wed, 22 Aug 2007 17:21:00 +0000

China wants to cut inefficiency and create a “conserving society”. But its efforts may be undermined by profligate local governments, argues Tang Hao.

In the past few years China’s central government has begun promoting the concept of a “conserving society”. But this should not just be an economic concept; it should be a mode of social development driven by need to conserve China’s resources. And in a country like China, with its traditionally “government-led society”, there can be no doubt that a “conserving government” is needed. However, local governments are among the most wasteful factors in Chinese society, and it is hard to see how they can currently help us achieve that goal.

Waste in government work

Firstly, we should look at some of the ostentatious offices that local governments build. One district in Zhengzhou, the capital of Henan province, has government buildings that cover 100 mu (66,670 square metres), with six office buildings and a giant hemispherical conference centre surrounded by greenery and fountains. Officials in one district of Fuyang, in Anhui province, have housed themselves in a building modelled on the White House. Locals have dubbed a local government office in the city of Chongqing “China’s most luxurious neighbourhood government office”; a township government office in the same city mimics Beijing’s Tian’anmen Gate. These buildings take up valuable urban real estate, yet are constructed and decorated to standards entirely out of step with the modest means of the populations they are supposed to serve.

We should also consider the day-to-day waste these institutions generate. Astronomical sums are spent on eating at restaurants on a government tab, on the use of government cars and the hosting of elaborate ceremonies. The use of government cars for private purposes cost the country over 200 billion yuan in 2006 (around US$26 billion), according to Liu Guangfu, a member of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference, around the same amount as the national defence budget. In fact, government vehicles are only used for their intended purposes one-third of the time.

Government also consumes shocking amounts of water and electricity. One survey in Beijing found that 48 government institutions used four times as much energy and three times as much water as the average Beijing resident. Government organisations were found to use as much as 9,402 kilowatt-hours per person every year – 19 times the average for the city. In other words, a public servant in their government office uses as much electricity in one day as an average citizen does in 19 days.

It seems the real source of waste is not the people, but their government. But why are public assets so readily wasted? The answer lies in a lack of supervision and punishment mechanisms, and a lack of respect for taxpayers on the part of the government.

Cutting consumption

US economist Thorstein Veblen wrote inThe Theory of the Leisure Class that conspicuous consumption is primarily aimed at displaying one’s superior status. But the case of China’s local governments is not that simple.

Recent increases in property and land prices have meant rocketing incomes – far in excess of GDP growth – for local governments, who have a monopoly on land resources. This has meant more and more waste, and in other countries the government could not act so freely. Excessive government spending betrays a lack of political awareness – and a lack of respect for the taxpayers and their money. Government officials believe the only way they can benefit from the money is to spend it, and act as if there were no point in saving it. The motto seems to be: as long as the money doesn’t actually end up in your pocket, spend it as you will. This attitude damages both social and political morals.

There are also three structural reasons for this wastefulness. Firstly, the limits of government power are unclear, and it is easy for officials to avoid taking responsibility for their actions. Secondly, there is a lack of government oversight, and there are no limits or supervision on government use of funds. Government offices are exempt from any limits on energy usage, and when electricity is cut to factories and homes to save power during peak hours, it is still business as usual for government. Thirdly, current supervision of public finances is inefficient, and government auditing of public finances requires far less in terms of cost-saving measures than private businesses. The foundations of both corruption and waste lie in these systematic problems. With anti-corruption measures becoming ever stronger, some officials are opting to spend money on large, luxurious projects that they can also benefit from.

Besides a lack of self-regulation, there is no public supervision of government. The taxpaying citizen – the natural regulator of government – is excluded from the supervision process. This is a major reason that local governments continue to consume so excessively at the public expense; the people do not have the awareness of western taxpayers and are so used to government waste that they sometimes see it as normal.

Waste is not the preserve of a few at the government level – it is a widespread social phenomena arising from structural factors. These failures mean that prudent government is not rewarded and profligacy goes unpunished. As economic entities acting in their own interest, local governments have the motive and the opportunity to benefit and become truly “wasteful governments”. And when the advocate of a “conserving society” is itself wasteful, its slogans will fall on deaf ears.

Building a conserving government

There are three changes that governments can make to prevent such waste. Firstly, the relationship between the government and the market should be put in order, and the government’s size must be reduced. In a government-led economy, constant interference in the market results in the government’s size and roles expanding, despite efforts to simplify it. Transforming and limiting these roles – and thus slimming government – is essential to reduce spending. Secondly, the state should consider reducing taxes, forcing local governments to tighten their belts. Thirdly, a new government budgeting mechanism must be put in place, government operational costs should be audited and effective internal control mechanisms should be established to bring free-spending officials under control.

There are many things people can do to help build a less wasteful government and society; for instance, we can apply public pressure to increase transparency and encourage openness in government spending. China Central Television has recently exposed a series of cases of excessive government spending, which contributed to the central government issuing policies on dealing with this waste. This type of action has limits, but it may help stop the rot from spreading – and improve mechanisms for government oversight. However, to truly transform our current “wasteful governments” into “conserving governments” we need to make social supervision regular and sustained, and not merely temporary protests.

Tang Hao, born in 1974, is a newspaper columnist, deputy editor of Shimin (Citizen) magazine, and assistant professor of politics at Huanan Normal University. His essays and opinion pieces have appeared in Contemporary International Relations, International Studies, Nanfang Daily, Yangcheng Evening News, Southern Window and many other publications.

Homepage photo by Xie Xian he Luobote

A way forward for China's environmental movement

Hao Tang — Thu, 20 Sep 2007 16:24:00 +0000

Will development really save the environment? Tang Hao's regular column continues with an incendiary analysis of China's growth, its political future and the way out... before the collapse.

On August 23, 2007, NASA released satellite photographs of the Pearl River delta taken in 1979 and 2003. The impact of the years since the start of the reform era have not been kind; urban and industrial areas have expanded while vegetation, waterways and shallows have disappeared. Any statistics I could list would be outweighed by the sheer visual impact of these pictures.

Picture: NASA

This is nothing new; the same process can be seen in industrialised nations. This mode of growth, driven by the pursuit of capital, may yet use up all of China's available resources. And this is particularly true in an area like the Pearl River delta, where growth comes from foreign investment. But why?

• Firstly, our economic framework sees the environment as a free resource to be used at will. Our air, soil or greenery is rarely calculated into the costs of growth. If any single business were to do so -- by installing wastewater treatment, for instance -- its costs would be higher than its competitors, favouring the polluters. When protecting the environment leads to bankruptcy, nobody wants to be green.

• Secondly, economic growth means more products and greater consumption, and this leads to individuals creating pollution and waste. The more a country develops, the bigger this problem becomes. The world's sewage, trash and industrial waste is growing to be a global headache, which is why developed countries have tried to shift the problem overseas. The controversy early this year over Britain's waste exports to China is one example, but there are many more foreign companies involved in this trade.

• Finally, when growth is driven by foreign capital to seek quick returns, exploitation of the environment is inevitable. However, when the resources are spent and the environment’s capacity is saturated, the capitalists will move on and take their factories elsewhere; just as they are by relocating from the Pearl River delta to the Yangtze River delta. The end result can only be a complete system collapse.

Slogans and development

This all points to a terrifying future. The single-minded pursuit of growth is unsustainable, and we have no way to solve these problems. A simple examination of the measures we already have in place shows they are unfit for purpose.

Sustainable development is currently approached from three main angles: technological advances, raising environmental awareness and cleaning up the impacts of growth. But seeking alternative sources of power and advanced technologies is not enough; such measures will simply boost production, leaving us with the same set of problems. And no-one is anyone willing to sacrifice their quality of life to protect the environment, a point made abundantly clear in August by a CCTV survey. As for the idea that economic growth will promote environmental protection, all the evidence seems to point the other way: economic growth and environmental damage go hand in hand.

Green slogans, activism and promises continue, but the environment continues to deteriorate. In the west, the Kyoto Protocol exists in name only: the US and Japan have increased carbon dioxide emissions while the EU has reluctantly kept emissions at the same levels as during the 1990s. Green GDP in China has been set aside indefinitely. The Pearl River delta -- accounting for 0.4% of China’s land, yet contributing 10% of its GDP -- pays the price of growth in air pollution, discoloured waterways, loss of land, urban expansion and acid rain over 70% of its area.

From activism to reform

The environment is under threat, and there is no value in pointing the finger at the irresponsibility of capitalism or the selfishness of certain groups. These are questions of economic principles or human nature. More importantly, our state of affairs is the product of a particular combination of economic, political and social structures. The biggest issue we face is not ongoing environmental degradation, but that our current system cannot handle the problem.

Our current system of economic growth cannot deal with ecological degradation. The claim that it will result in the best outcome for the majority of people is a mere excuse; economic growth is controlled by a minority who also benefit from it. In many countries growth has failed to eradicate poverty; globalisation and international competition has meant many countries sacrificing their environment.

Current political systems are also unable to solve the problem. This is partly thanks to the inherent weakness of democratic politics, but also because the globalisation of capital has made ecological destruction a cross-border problem that democratic politics cannot take account of. Even the world’s most powerful market economy, the US, ignores the reality of the situation– as shown by President Bush’s repeated defences of big polluters.

The lack of global governance, the dominance of capital, the strength of market economics and the protection offered by powerful countries mean the problem is becoming ever more serious while national efforts become ever more disappointing. Only global public participation can provide the power we need. After all, it is the people who suffer most.

The goal must be a permanent, concrete change, involving the establishment of strong rules and a fundamental system. It will take place over several stages, with countries and peoples first deciding to cease excessive development and waste, then carrying out reforms based on public participation and unity, and finally establishing domestic and international systems. It is incredible that there is still no global organisation coordinating environmental policy.

The environmental movement must shift its focus to reforming the system. It must fix its eye on our rules and our penalties, or it has no hope. The public – those most affected by environmental change – must have more political input.

However, solving environmental problems by expanding democracy would face its own challenges. Are democratic processes really suitable for the environmental issues ahead of us? Can participants understand the complex scientific issues under discussion? Very few will choose to sacrifice economic growth for the sake of the environment. If we could only have one, which would we choose?

The globalisation of capital is breaking all boundaries, and we must meet it with a matching unity among the people of the world. Only then will we be able to call a halt to those interests despoiling our homelands -- before all our lands turn to desert.

An environmental approach to technology

Hao Tang — Wed, 21 Nov 2007 11:45:00 +0000

The transfer of clean technologies to the developing world is only one part of the solution to the global environment crisis, writes Tang Hao. We must also change our approach to new technology on a philosophical level.

The diffusion of clean technologies has always been seen as a way to solve the environmental problems we face in a globalised age. According to a report by the Club of Madrid and the UN Foundation, a fund of US$10 billion for technology transfer from developed to developing nations would be enough to start the fight against greenhouse-gas emissions.

However, the reality is somewhat different. Conflicts over the transfer of environmental technologies are worsening. Developing countries maintain that rich countries are the world’s major polluters, and have consumed most of the world’s resources since the Industrial Revolution – and therefore have a responsibility to transfer clean technology to help them reduce their emissions. Developed countries, at the same time, hold that poor countries want something for nothing, and they are failing to control their own pollution.

This debate has put the question of clean technology in an awkward position. The EU has always been outspoken on environmental issues, but to some countries this is a way the EU looks out for itself, while it continues to uphold barriers to technology transfer. The EU is a world leader in environmental technology; the sector is a new source of its economic growth. But if Europe remains unwilling to transfer green technology, large numbers of products from developing countries will be refused entry to EU markets, giving rise to conflict.

In the US, the debate may be less fierce, but the situation is worse. Green technology is used as an excuse for not adopting wide-ranging environmental policy. James Connaughton, chair of the White House Council on Environmental Quality, continues to reject mandatory caps on emissions, asserting that “the solution to climate change is the advancement of technology." His position is that the deteriorating environment is nothing to worry about, when future technology holds the solution. Expectations of future technological advance have thus become an excuse for ruining the environment today. In fact, we have the technology; the problem is we don’t use it.

Technology and ethics

The debate over international technological cooperation continues, even as the climate heats up. But this does not only arise because of conflicting national interests, it also hints at problems with our understanding of technology.

Today’s society may be technologically developed and powerful, but we have never been at greater risk of environmental disaster, nuclear war and infectious disease. We have developed an almost superstitious belief in technology, often seeing its advance as our only hope. But can technological advances solve our environmental crisis? Are they adequate to overcome these threats to our existence?

In fact, the problems we face are in large part caused by technologies that give us mastery over nature. Otherwise we would not have brought devastation to our planet with such efficiency. In reality, most environmental problems are caused by rapidly developing technology. For instance, agricultural mechanisation in north China has accelerated desertification. Marine and fishing technology has pushed the whale to the brink of extinction. Large dams have completely altered environments over areas of tens of thousands of square kilometres.

Technology does not necessarily advance an ethical agenda. The more polluted the environment is, the better the market for technology that cleans it up. The conflict of interests this presents is clear. In the case of biofuels, at least one environmental expert has noted how inhuman it is to burn massive quantities of food as fuel, when hundreds of millions of people are malnourished. Our ethical approach to technology has surely become confused.

Relying on future technology allows polluters to lay the burden of solving the environmental problems at the feet of future generations. The Bush administration’s environmental policy has followed this illusory path. Maybe our saviour technology will appear, but to risk the collapse of our civilisation on that chance is unreasonable.

New approaches

We live in an age that has mastered many types of technology, but has given rise to two principal approaches to technology: reliance and fear. The attitude of reliance cheers on technology with its every new advance. The fearful approach resembles Hollywood movies where robots rule the world.

Both attitudes are understandable responses, and despite their differences, they have one thing in common. They both hold that humanity is – or will be – controlled by technology.

Our estrangement from nature has made us view technology as a self-determining, self-developing system with an internal logic outside our control. This attitude puts us at risk from technological development, which we regard as unavoidable and unpredictable in its consequences.

Solving the environmental crisis needs not only new technology, but also a new philosophy of technology. We need to control the direction in which technology grows, and learn how to avoid the consequences of unbalanced development.

A change in philosophical approach will help to make some necessary changes. Technology transfer is essential to solve environmental problems, but the claim that our current technology is inadequate is an excuse – whether it is deployed in China, the US or the EU. We need a global system of technological cooperation, with proper organisation, planning and regulations – and a way to evaluate the potential threats of new technologies.

We urgently need a global technological ethics committee to consider the environmental and social impact of new technologies before they are implemented. Regulations on the compulsory transfer and licensing of technology are also needed to ensure clean technology is fully brought into play. This may help turn us away from sacrificing long-term interests for short-term benefits.

Homepage photo by rutty

Xiamen PX: a turning point?

Hao Tang — Wed, 16 Jan 2008 11:04:00 +0000

The halting of a controversial petrochemical project in south China was a victory for people power, writes Tang Hao. Now the country should consider the reforms it needs to enshrine public participation in law.

As ecological destruction makes an ever more significant impact on daily life in China, public participation in environmental protection has increased. The State Environmental Protection Administration (SEPA) has encouraged this trend, and regards participation as essential to solving environmental issues. In 2006 a document from China’s cabinet, the State Council, specified that public consultations must be held in cases when a project will have an impact on the public’s environmental interests. SEPA regulations state that participation is necessary for environmental impact assessments and that the publication of environmental information is a prerequisite. Many officials have offered support, verbal and written, for public participation in environmental protection.

Last month in the southern Chinese city of Xiamen (also known as Amoy), these words were put into practice. The provincial and municipal government reportedly bowed to public pressure and halted construction on a Taiwanese-invested paraxylene (PX) petrochemical plant. The project is now being moved to the southern Fujian city of Zhangzhou. Its opponents included white-collar workers, the elderly and housewives, who used a range of methods to express their opposition, from text-message campaigns, online protests, demonstrations at public hearings and letters written by academics, to marches though the streets.

This is generally considered a victory for public participation; the central government genuinely listened to environmental concerns and the Xiamen government worked to protect the city. More importantly, the events established a new type of activism, which focused on a single issue in order to change governmental habits and the law. For government officials, this will mean new rules on how they act. Cadres will be more careful to at least consider the environment. Green is a colour on the ascendant.

Outside China, the green movement has relied on public participation to grow, ultimately transforming the political sphere. The same thing seems to have happened in Xiamen. But the development of public participation in China is still unfinished, and it faces systematic obstacles. China’s environmental impact assessment law affirms the principle of public participation, but it does not lay out the process to achieve this, or regulate how government should handle public opinion. The public has no right to veto, leaving the oversight of major projects and the right to environmental information in something of a no man’s land.

These system failures have two consequences. First, they reduce the extent to which the public can participate in environmental issues. Currently, the public can only take part at a basic, everyday level. The government will encourage people to conserve water and power, but not participate at any higher level; non-governmental activity has no support. Second, the lack of public participation means the environmental crisis is allowed to continue. While the residents of Xiamen celebrate their win, other ecologically destructive projects are going ahead. Work is already underway on the eastern and central sections of the south-to-north water transfer. The project already has an opening date, but the public were not told when the work started, much less how it was approved. A nuclear plant at Rushan in Shandong has also been given the go-ahead without the consultation of the public or SEPA. Xiamen’s PX project is moving to Zhangzhou, but what do the city’s residents think of the impact there? Nobody knows. Unless the public is involved, these projects could cause major harm. A loan from the Agricultural Bank for 6.3 billion yuan (US$867 million), intended for the 10.08 billion yuan (US$1.4 billion) PX project, has been frozen – a loss that would not have been incurred if the public had been involved earlier. In other areas, projects have given rise to frequent complaints – and even “mass incidents”.

Public participation means breaking the government’s monopoly on power. This explains the current obstruction of environmental protection in China. The low-key approach to major projects and decisions betrays a lack of trust in public participation. But environmental problems do not disappear just because policy-makers ignore them. When problems become bad enough, the government is left with no choice but to respond. Great power brings great responsibility. If the government is all-powerful, it is also deemed responsible for all.

The power to make decisions on major projects should not lie with government alone, but with the public. The public will bear the consequences of any decisions made, so should not be left out of the decision-making process. Environmental awareness among the Chinese public is at an all-time high, in sharp contrast to the state of environmental governance. This leads to pressure for reform: a 2005 survey found that over 80% of Chinese citizens are aware of pollution, waste disposal and water treatment problems. There is an urgent desire for a clean, unpolluted environment.

With local governments pressing ahead with harmful projects, and the public ever less willing to accept them, Xiamen was a turning point. People want to participate, but they are coming up against systematic obstruction. An unprecedented victory in Xiamen, however, means that the public is no longer helpless; they are empowered to fight anti-environment forces. With the development of the economy and civil society, this power will only get stronger. Xiamen should not be seen as a single victory, but the start of a series of struggles. Environmental protection is not about individual wins. It is about reforms to stop these same problems arising again.

Government and business dominate environmental issues; people need stronger mechanisms to help them get involved. This will mean a switch in focus from single-issue campaigns to improvements in law and in government habits. And this requires the government and the people to work together. Mechanisms helping the interaction of the two need to be put in place as soon as possible. The government needs to stop participating as an interested party and become an arbitrator between different parties’ interests. They should publish environmental information for the benefit of the public, promote public-interest lawsuits on environmental issues and improve their relations with green NGOs, which will allow civil society to monitor environmental decision-making. At the same time, the public should keep up its determined, yet moderate, action. The public must learn how to apply maximum pressure in a calm fashion.

Turning awareness into action will always be a long and painful process, particularly in China. But the process is underway – and it shows no signs of letting up.

Tang Hao is a newspaper columnist, deputy editor of Shimin (Citizen) magazine, and assistant professor of politics at Huanan Normal University. His essays and opinion pieces have appeared in Contemporary International Relations, International Studies, Nanfang Daily, Yangcheng Evening News, Southern Window and many other publications.

Learning from the snow crisis

Hao Tang — Wed, 13 Feb 2008 09:57:00 +0000

Heavy snow brought havoc to south China in recent weeks, and climate scientists say extreme weather will become more frequent. The country needs to improve its ability to withstand disaster, writes Tang Hao.

This winter brought unprecedented cold weather to south China; sustained sub-zero temperatures, freezing rain and snow left citizens struggling to keep warm. The extreme weather resulted in power cuts and paralysed road and rail links across the country, stranding millions at bus and rail stations and on ice-covered roads. The timing exacerbated the situation: the Lunar New Year is always the busiest time for China’s transport networks. In the worst-affected provinces of Hunan and Guizhou large areas were without power or even water. One hundred million people were affected across 19 provinces, causing economic damages to the tune of 50 billion yuan (almost US$7 billion), the State Council said.

Chinese reports increasingly describe the country’s weather as unusual: “the worst flood in a century”, “the worst drought in decades” and now “the worst snows in half a century”. But the more these “rare” weather events occur, the less rare they become. Extreme weather is on the rise in China; abnormal weather is becoming the norm. As China cleans up after this latest disaster, we should ask ourselves why we are so weak in the face of these events. Extreme weather may become an unavoidable part of global climate change, but that doesn’t mean it has to have such serious consequences. We need to consider the cause of the problem, but also look at the social and structural factors that worsen its effects.

The sequence of disasters that has hit China in recent years shows how economic growth has been achieved at an environmental cost. We now face grave ecological challenges. Political and social issues, however, are intertwined with problems caused by the ravages of the climate. These issues worsen and accelerate the effects of weather disasters, and introduce new complexity and uncertainty in China’s process of modernisation.

The snows strongly illustrated the economic development gap across different areas of the country, as well as problems with the household registration system, the one-directional nature of population flow and the strength of traditional ideas in China. The consequences of these problems were also mostly felt by the lower and middle strata of Chinese society. The mass migration at New Year is held up as evidence of strong links to home villages, but in fact it is caused by genuine need. The media called for migrant workers to spend their holiday in the cities, and ignored their wish to return home after a year or more spent away. Yet migrant workers struggle to survive in the cities and face discrimination; their return home is a spiritual refuge as much as it is a holiday. The workers trapped at the train stations are the very foundation of Chinese society; they should be able to settle in our cities without migrating annually. It was the extreme weather that stopped them travelling, but what forced them to make the trip in the first place?

Local governments in south China pulled out all the stops; local leaders headed for the frontlines, and they deserve to be applauded. But congestion, price rises, power cuts and energy shortages still occurred. The disaster did not happen overnight: its effects were worsened by slow response and the inefficiency of the over-centralised power network. A lack of preparedness and transparency – perhaps even including misinformation – were responsible for chaos in Guangzhou on February 3, where a railway station stampede left one dead and one injured. Exaggerated, positive reports meant travellers who had already left the railway station returned, putting too much pressure on railway staff. Problems with coal delivery and energy supply cannot be entirely blamed on the weather either. As certain newspaper reports noted, a lack of communication and insufficiently robust administrative systems may have been equally to blame.

Despite this grave state of affairs, reporting was insufficiently serious. In the news reporting of the disasters, people wanted to know what was happening, and the media in Guangdong province provided full and prompt reports. At a national level, however, there was more propaganda than news, causing a certain level of confusion.

China has recently seen a number of “once in a century” disasters; our environment is quietly – perhaps unavoidably – changing. Dealing with natural disasters will become a more frequent undertaking. The government can be left to deal with one-off events, but society will need to mobilise and protect itself from ever more frequent disasters. The country’s failure to deal with large-scale disasters, from organisation and management to communication and coordination, demonstrates an imbalance between economic development and socio-political modernisation. This cannot be solved by politicians or propaganda. Civil society and public ethics are needed to guide the improvements.

As I write, the cold weather continues, but eventually it will ease and the crowds will disperse. When will the next disaster strike, however? Environmental action alone will not combat the social problems that will arise or worsen with greater disasters. Sustainable development requires that politics and the environment are given equal consideration. The efforts we make will not stop disasters happening, but they will better equip us to deal with them and reduce losses. With the foundation of a modern economy now in place, we must develop civil society and the ability of the population to mobilise, building a modern politics and a modern society. It is essential for our survival.

Read more: Three R’s for surviving environmental change by Cleo Paskal

Homepage photo by monkeyking

The Great Smog of Guangzhou

Hao Tang — Wed, 30 Apr 2008 11:08:00 +0000

The residents of China’s Pearl River delta suffer serious air pollution every day. But, writes Tang Hao, few understand how near they are to potential disaster. To alleviate the situation, he adds, monitoring standards must be improved.

Smog is becoming an ever more frequent feature of Guangzhou’s weather, and levels of particulate matter in the air are increasing too. As a result, more people are suffering the symptoms of respiratory diseases, which include shortness of breath, coughs, dizziness, weakness, nausea and even the loss of temper. But since the situation seemingly presents no immediate threat to life, it is easy to ignore.

But as the situation worsens, that may change. In early April the Southern Weekend newspaper carried a report about China’s worsening air pollution, which warned that London’s Great Smog may be repeated in Guangzhou. The Great Smog of December 1952 is famous as the world’s worst case of air pollution. In only five days more than 4,000 people in the British capital died from respiratory illnesses, many of them elderly people. In the following months a further 8,000 died. As early as the end of 2004, Tang Xiaoyan, a professor at the Peking University College of Environmental Science, made similar predictions based on his research: that a severe photochemical smog could arise in Guangzhou – or even across the entire Pearl River delta.

In fact, the air in the Pearl River delta has already been severely polluted by the manufacturing industry: air quality levels already fall to levels seen in London in 1952. The city of Shenzhen saw a record-breaking 226 days of smog in 2007. Smog is spreading across whole regions: in the urban areas around the Pearl River delta and around the whole Beijing and Tianjin metropolitan area. These cities are the main source of pollution and they also suffer from it the most. In 2006 only 4.3% of China’s 559 cities reached Class I air quality (the cleanest level), 58.1% averaged in Class II, 28.5% at Class III and the remaining 9.1% at even lower levels.

Almost every city in the Pearl River delta suffers from smog all year round. And as the provincial government attempts to shift the worst polluters out of the area, the problem only moves to the provinces of Jiangxi, Hunan and the northern part of Guangdong. I recently visited Qingxin, a county in central Guangzhou, which used to be renowned for its clean air, but now faces pollution from industries relocated from the Pearl River delta. Industrial output has been increasing every year, with many factories sprouting up in its still-expanding industrial zones. Economically, it has been a great success, but the damage to air quality is easy to see on your windscreen as the rain dries and leaves dirty grey marks.

Urban air pollution is a major threat to public health in China. Smog is made up of the soot and dust in the polluted air above our cities; it is a complex mix of hundreds of different types of particulate matter. Those most harmful to human health are tiny aerosol particles: minerals, salt, sulphates and nitrates that lodge in the lungs and breathing passages, giving rise to rhinitis and bronchitis – and cancer in the long term. Outdoor air pollution kills around 300,000 people in China every year, according to research in 2003 by Wang Jinnan, of the China Environmental Planning Institute. The country’s city dwellers have become like vacuum cleaners, each one of us filtering out the particulates from 15 cubic metres of air a day. The difference in air quality is striking to anyone who travels overseas.

Many are unaware of the risks and fail to connect their health problems with air pollution. But the public do not only suffer from the pollution, they also produce it. Surveys indicate that sources of urban air pollution are changing in the Pearl River delta; vehicle emissions are becoming the main culprit and may even exceed emissions from industry. In 2007 there were 1.8 million cars on Guangzhou’s roads and this number is growing by 150,000 every year. We are facing a gradual, yet potentially fatal, process that is reaching a tipping point: the conditions for air pollution to become very acute are already in place. Guangzhou’s unique climate has so far protected the city, but if things continue, a disaster is almost inevitable.

An environmental crisis is not like other emergencies. An isolated pollution accident or an explosion, for instance, occurs suddenly and can be dealt with quickly. An environmental crisis gathers form gradually on a large scale; once formed, it is hard to solve quickly. It is not a temporary problem, but something we have to live with every day. Therefore, we do not only need emergency measures, but also changes in our everyday life. We need laws that require local governments to control polluting industries, and measures to prevent air pollution in cities. Most importantly, we must find a way to alleviate a long-term crisis.

China’s government, businesses and people are not paying enough attention to the risks of a large-scale environmental disaster. When it is clear that polluters are not going to change their ways, the government should intervene. However, the gravity of the situation we face today can partly be blamed on government failures. For example, the very scale used to measure atmospheric pollution fails to reflect actual conditions. China’s environment authorities recognise a yearly average of 100 milligrams of particulate matter per cubic metre of air as a safe standard, five times the World Health Organization’s standard. They also do not measure particles over 2.5 nanometres in diameter, despite the fact they are the most toxic. There are huge differences between what the official data shows and what the public experiences. The law does not enforce environmental rulings and solve disputes as it should. Where in other countries the courts would handle environmental issues, in China the government takes control, which is far less efficient. The power of the public and civil society is weak; the right to be informed on environmental issues is not secure.

Of course, the system has also seen progress. For example, Guangzhou has been the first city to implement a smog forecasting system and many other cities are following suit. But scientists and the government must change China’s monitoring standards and make the results public. There are historical reasons for urban pollution in China’s cities, but we still have time to make a change and prevent chronic problems becoming an acute crisis. The clock is ticking.

Homepage photo by 23hours