China Environmental Law

The Panyu waste incineration plant protest in Guangzhou last week was important for a number of reasons, but one of the most thoughtful takes on the event comes from an unlikely source, the Communist Party of China’s Guangdong Party School.

In an article entitled, “Confronting pollution: ‘expel it’ or ‘manage it’”? (I’d welcome a better translation, this is the original Chinese:面对污染”赶”还是”治”？) first published in the Nanfang Daily and reprinted at the China Energy Conservation and Environmental Protection Network, a provincial party school cadre presents a balanced, nuanced, and practical prescription for addressing situations where general societal needs impose disproportional environmental burdens on a subset of the population.

His or her points (the author is not named):

Environmental awareness has risen among the people with improving economic conditions.  At the same time there has been a rise in polluting entities to meet the demands of an improving economy.  This has created difficult “contradictions.” Who wants a waste incineration power plant, electric substation, gas stations, hospital or a variety of other polluting facilities built close to their own home, but the reality is that socio-economic development and people’s livelihoods are inseparable from these facilities.  How to resolve this contradiction is a test for the government, but also a test of the wisdom of the people.

When people hear that a potentially polluting facility will be built in their neighborhood, their first reaction is to try to “expel” it, and they will use a number of means to “sabotage” the project.  The author says this reaction is actually a great improvement from earlier years when people did not dare mount such opposition.

However, the result of this type of opposition is simply to have the facility moved from a developed to an undeveloped region, from a region where economically empowered people live to an area where more vulnerable people live, and from densely to sparsely populated areas.  The writer analogizes such an outcome to the developed world’s movement of their polluting facilities to China.  Such moves did little to improve economic conditions in China, and left China with a legacy of pollution it now must pay to clean up.

The alternative approach to moving the pollution problem elsewhere is to “manage” the problem by understanding it in a more holistic fashion.  Shifting pollution around from one region to another doesn’t decrease the total amount of pollution.  We must adopt rational production and treatment processes that reduce the amount of pollutants generated in the first instance.

The author notes some of the voices raised in protest regarding the Panyu waste incineration facility (although not the loudest) argued that this type of facility should not be built anywhere in the country and the government should place more emphasis on recycling, waste separation, and recovery.

Now, the author says, it is time to test the Government’s wisdom.  It must trust the people and work with them to address the incineration plant issue and gain their confidence.  The pollution management of any project must be open and transparent and gain the full trust of the people.  Only then will people no longer be afraid and have to resort to confrontational options.  If the Panyu waste incineration plant, as reported, will meet EU emissions standards, this fact and its consequences should be explained to the people.  Both the government and the people must genuinely and sincerely adopt a “management” approach to pollution problems.

Guangdong sounds like its got a party school worth attending!