China's waters of life are the waters of death

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China's waters of life are the waters of death
The River Runs Black: The Environmental Challenge to China's Future by Elizabeth C Economy

Reviewed by Macabe Keliher

China has had a long and sordid history of environmental contravention. From deforestation in the Tang Dynasty (618-907), to the terracing of the country's hills in the Ming (1368-1644), to misappropriation of funds to control flooding in the late Qing (1644-1911), China's environmental degradation has for centuries created catastrophes costly to both human life and the economy.

Today is no exception, as Elizabeth Economy, senior fellow and director of Asian studies at the New York-based Council on Foreign Relations, shows in The River Runs Black . If Chinese died by the thousands and millions in centuries past from floods and starvation, they do not have an easier time today despite technological innovation, and often die because of it. In 2002, China boasted six of the world's 10 most polluted cities, in which more than 300,000 people die annually from air-pollution-related ailments. More than 75% of China's rivers contain so much pollution that they cannot support fish or be tapped for drinking water. And desert covers some 25% of the country as a result of continued deforestation and grassland degradation.

"With one-quarter of the world's population, centuries of grand-scale campaigns to transform the natural environment for man's benefit, intensive and unfettered economic development, and, most recently, its entry into the global economy, China has laid waste to its resources," Economy writes.

Historically, China lacked "any compelling ethos of conservation", according to Economy, which, as a direct result, has passed into today's society and continues to lead to environmental degradation. "Attitudes, institutions, and policies evolved from traditional folk understandings and philosophical thought, such as Confucianism, which most often promoted man's need to use nature for his own benefit." Thus the only impetus for environmental reform or pollution control in China today comes from adverse economic or health impacts.
http://atimes.com/atimes/China/FG24Ad03.html