China Environmental Law

Littering is endemic in China.  We made the mistake of visiting the Great Wall during the height of Spring Festival: it goes without saying the top of the wall was a sea of people, but a glance over the side revealed a sea of debris and steady barrage of plastic bottles, wadded food wrappers, and children’s excrement (gathered in various media) being hurled at some unseen invader on the slopes below.

In urban areas, armies of paid street sweepers attend to this phenomenon with their twig brooms. It is in rural areas where litter becomes more of a problem, as no one bothers to remove garbage without residual value. Much of the waste will make its way into streams and rivers.  China Daily ran a story today about how the Kuzhu river “near World Heritage site Zhangjiajie National Forest Park” in Hunan Province “is being polluted by thousands of tons of waste being dumped directly into the river.”

Locals blame the increased trash on the rise of tourism.  This could well be the case if our Great Wall experience was any indication.  The solution?

Chen Wenjun, vice-director of the tourism college of Guangzhou University, told sohu.com that a specific law on tourism is a key solution to the problem as it would help set up a strict environmental protection system for the tourism industry.

This approach would no doubt solve the problem in much the same way that China’s “strict environmental protection system” for atmospheric pollution has left China with pristine air.

I think it’s time for a massive public education campaign.  I am old enough to remember a time when American highways and rivers were strewn with trash as well.  When an old habit of littering met new forms of disposable packaging, the highways and byways of the US became choked with the detritus of the convenience culture.

Signs were erected threatening $500 fines for littering, but even in relatively law-abiding America, these had little effect.  I am willing to stand corrected by some graduate student who has written a thesis on this topic, but in my opinion what put a stop to wide-spread littering in the US was a relentless public relations campaign against the practice.  Who of a certain age does not remember the native American in full traditional rig standing by the side of the road along the unspoiled prairie and shedding a silent tear as out of the window of a passing car flies the remains of a McDonald’s Happy Meal?

I’m sure someone can design a culturally appropriate education program for China.  Let’s see, maybe an indigenous inhabitant of a land now being increasingly populated by Hans who. . . .  Well on second thought, I’ll leave the story board to the China experts.