Dear All,
My name is Andrew Scheineson, and I am the deputy editor of China Green
News, <http://eng.greensos.cn> a Beijing-based NGO with the mission of
making China's domestic environmental news available to a broader
English-speaking
audience. In order to increase the flow of environmental news flowing out of
the mainland, we have recently launched a new feature we call the China
Environment Brief! The Brief, to be published three days a week, takes the
most important Chinese articles from local and national news sources and
provides (reasonably) concise summaries of the most relevant information,
also providing important contextual information for some of the most complex
problems confronting China today. The articles we choose cover a wide
assortment of topics, from ecological sustainability to water pollution to
environmental law and health. Some of the articles we provide are positive.
Some are critical. Regardless of the article's (or our) stance, we do our
best to provide an unbiased summary of the facts of the story. And in doing
so we try to provide China's environmental news media with a voice that can
be surprisingly frank and revealing.
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Best,
Andrew Scheineson**
*CHINA ENVIRONMENT BRIEF **(A News Summary from China Green
News<http://eng.greensos.cn/>
)*
*Monday May 3, 2010*
*To subscribe: click here <http://www.mailermailer.com/x?oid=1018092b>.*
* *
*In Today’s Brief*
~Ecology To Be Key Concern of Yushu Recovery
~Environmental Vocabulary of the Shanghai Expo
~Rural Environment Can’t Be Ignored
~Regulations on Ecological Compensation in Draft Phase
~English Stories from the Chinese Press
*Out of the Dust, Qinghai Imagines New, Ecological Yushu*
Qinghai is dreaming big and green in the aftermath of the Yushu earthquake.
Provincial environmental officials are espousing plans to rebuild Yushu as
an ecotourist
hub<http://news.xinhuanet.com/environment/2010-04/30/c_1266101.htm>over
the next five years, Xinhua reported Friday. The Yushu Tibetan
Autonomous Region, as it is formally known, is a central part of the high,
grassy plateau that houses the headwaters of the Yangtze, Yellow, and
Lancang (which becomes the Mekong in Southeast Asia) rivers. As such,
officials claim they not only want to harness the ecological value of the
area for economic growth for the future, but will also work to ensure that
recovery and rebuilding efforts not harm the Three Rivers Region’s water
resources or its biodiversity.
According to the article and other domestic reports, the April 14 earthquake
has caused limited or no damage to the area’s biodiversity or its water
quality. As for disaster relief and recovery work, though the majority of
the thousands of displaced residents are currently living on the grassland
with limited sanitation infrastructure, officials maintain that the
potential environmental damage is not an object of concern. “[Temporary
shelters on the grassland] are not equivalent to natural damage, as the
grassland has the ability to recover, and the technology [for grassland
recovery] is already well-developed,” the director of the Qinghai
environmental monitoring bureau said.
For more, read this article from the *Beijing Review* on earthquake
reconstruction in
Yushu<http://www.bjreview.com.cn/nation/txt/2010-04/30/content_268937.htm>(English)
*Eco-Friendly Buzz Words for the Shanghai Expo*
The Shanghai World Fair <http://en.expo2010.cn/> opened its doors and
pavilions to the world last Friday with an elaborate opening ceremony filled
with performances, fireworks, and, naturally, Jackie Chan. As the first
hordes swarm through the fairgrounds, which will be buffeted by some 70
million visitors over the six-month exhibition, Expo officials offered media
covering the spectacle a list of
“keywords”<http://www.stdaily.com/kjrb/content/2010-05/02/content_182208.htm>[Sci.
and Tech Daily] that will define the event:
City: At the time of the first World Fair, held in London in 1851, the
global urban population was 6%. Today, it is pushing 50% and rising fast.
Return: To a simpler, greener way of life, that is. The Expo will promote
the greater use of bicycles in cities, along with other less energy
intensive ways of urban living.
Low Carbon: The queen of buzzing words at the so-called “Green Expo”. With
200 fuel cell cars and 300 electric vehicles operating on the Expo site, and
buildings designed to harness the suns rays for 75% of their interior
lighting, fair organizers have become a vocal proponent of the fight against
global warming.
Cycles: Water seems to be the sub-keyword here, as the Expo wants to adopt a
traditional conservation philosophy, i.e. comprehensive use, of water
resources. The fair will collect rainwater for use, so as to not waste a
valuable resource in this seaside city, which only uses 10% of its rainwater
at present.
Energy Conservation: Fair pavilions will use photovoltaic cells and wind
turbines to produce much of their energy.
Other buzzwords for the fair include “harmony”, “imagination”, and “family”.
*Overlooked by Policymakers, Rural Environment Decaying Quickly*
Amidst the rush to clean up cities and factories, Zhu Deming is worried that
environmental policymakers have ignored the alarming erosion of ecological
quality in the countryside. In a *China Environmental News *article, he
warns that environmental management in villages and
towns<http://www.cenews.com.cn/xwzx/gd/qt/201004/t20100428_655438.html>has
been neglected. Physical and legal infrastructure created for
factories,
cities, and urban businesses has led to marked improvement in pollution
levels and other areas. But even as “eco-cities” are being built from
scratch, rural areas that still represent most of the land and people in
China are largely unaccounted for. China’s law books mostly skirt over
questions like rural point-source pollution and fertilizer runoff. Funding
for rural environmental projects is scarce. Education levels are low.
Without a rapid change of direction, Zhu warns, the Chinese countryside
could face serious ecological destruction and health problems, which would
have as ruinous an impact on the country as urban pollution.
*Regulations on Ecological Compensation Advance, But Still Far Away*
Last Friday, the National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC) announced
that central regulations on payment for ecological
services<http://www.cfi.net.cn/p20100430001475.html>[Daily Economic
News] had formally entered the draft stage, raising
prospects of a national system regulating compensation standards, funding
sources, and other rights and responsibilities for protection of natural
resources. Ma Jun, the director of the influential Institute of Public and
Environmental Affairs <en.ipe.org.cn>, noted that national natural resource
laws lack concrete measures for ecological compensation, which these new
regulations could help remedy. People familiar with the compensation draft
warned, however, that a final system would take at least three years to be
formally implemented.
Parts of China, including the area around Lake Taihu, have recently launched
pilot ecological compensation projects, and the central government has
invested billions in a reforestation project entitled “Grain to Green” since
2002. There are no comprehensive national regulations for such endeavors,
however.
*English Stories from the Chinese Press*
*May 3*
Wen calls for scientific rebuilding of quake
zone<http://tibet.news.cn/english/2010-05/03/c_13276234.htm>(Xinhua)
**
Shanghai Expo imagines green cities of the
future<http://news.xinhuanet.com/english2010/sci/2010-05/03/c_13276869.htm>(Xinhua)
*May 1*
Shanghai Expo sends low-carbon
message<http://news.xinhuanet.com/english2010/china/2010-05/01/c_13275137.htm>(Xinhua)
Melting snow wrecks havoc in northern
Xinjiang<http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/china/2010-05/01/content_9801576.htm>(Xinhua)
*April 29*
China Urges Greater Energy-Saving, Emission
Reductions<http://www.bjreview.com.cn/headline/txt/2010-04/29/content_267950.htm>(Beijing
Review)
~Prepared by Andrew Scheineson
------------------------------
China Environment Brief and China Green News are products of Green Earth
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