An environmental disaster killed 750,000 Chinese last year, and the government is worried. So worried, in fact, that it’s strong-armed the
World Bank into keeping it a secret.
“The World Bank was told that it could not publish this information. It was too sensitive and could cause social unrest,� one adviser to the study told the Financial Times.
So what is this environmental disaster? Nuclear waste? Contaminated water or food? Pesticide residue? Nope. Air pollution in China’s larger cities, with a bit over half caused by outdoor air pollution and the balance caused by indoor air pollution from fuel stoves and the like. By comparison, contaminated water killed 60,000 Chinese, mostly in rural areas.
Of course the ostrich tendancies of the Chinese government on something that is killing so many of their citizens is deplorable, but I doubt that our efforts at deploring will affect them one way or the other. By contrast, we in the developed world do have a substantial (though lamentably inadequate) aid budget. Perhaps urban air pollution should go higher up the priority list than it currently is?
Jaaysus. IG Faben on their best days couldn’t bump-off that many people in a 12-month period.
Looks to me like the Chinese have a bit of a problem.
Not so. The Chinese government is acutely sensitive to foreign opinion and local activists (of whom there are very many) benefit greatly from the support of individuals and organizations overseas. See China Dialogue, for example: http://www.chinadialogue.net/
Good post, Robert. Urban air pollution is an underrated cause of death everywhere, not just in developing countries.
Evan: in terms of numbers of deaths, the comparison is not an unfair one. Even when you convert it back to proportions, slightly fewer than 1 in 10 Chinese citizens dies earlier than they would otherwise have because of air pollution. Unfortunately, the story doesn’t give life-years lost, but in American studies the mean life-years lost because of pollution, for those that die prematurely, was in the order of a decade.
Melaluca: quite true, and I’ve posted on it previously (though that post turned into a flamefest when I had a specific dig at the Greens on the issue). When you factor in the health costs from pollution, switching to public transport and reducing combustion vehicle usage in urban areas starts to look real cheap even before considering greenhouse issues.
Complicating the picture the west is torn between deploring the pollution and being thankful for the global dimming effect of that amount or airbourne particulate matter. Beware the day when they stop.
Will all the Olympic venues use canned air? If I was an elite athlete, I’d be thinking of other events to compete in.
It’s a big problem, particularly for the endurance events. The Chinese are spending up big (and planning to shut much of Beijing’s industry down temporarily) to reduce the problem, but it’s still likely to be pretty awful if the weather is unfavourable.
Robert, melaleuca et al,
Indeed, the extraordinary thing about air pollution is that it’s by no means just the Chinese who are suppressing its discussion. There are still major issues in the developed world, including Australia, which are going largely ignored, if not deliberately suppressed.
Back when I was at Greenpeace a while ago, we put out a report with the AMA (trying to find it to link to it…) on air pollution in Australia. Worked hard, thought we had a great new yarn. It was completely ignored by the media and governments. Sank like a stone.
That’s the sad thing, relating back to your previous post, Robert. When you’re a sideline player, it’s really damn hard to make the agenda. If no-one’s interested in air pollution, all you can really do is raise it every now and then and hope that some day it’ll grab a headline. Sure, the Greens could talk about it more, but there’s only so much space you can use on an issue that is so far away from the centre…
Tim, I understand the limitations of a small political party to put things onto the agenda, but what about membership organizations like Greenpeace? Aren’t they in a position where they can bring issues like this – an environmental issue that is killing and injuring people as well as damaging wildlife – to the attention of their members on a long-term basis?
Robert, sure Greenpeace could keep raising it with its members, but, if you are a major organisation relying entirely on donations from individuals, you also need to look like you are relevant to what’s going on in the world – like you’re a player. Otherwise people will stop donating to you.
Greenpeace does raise air pollution, particularly through its China operations communicating out to the other regional offices. It also spent many years communicating about climate change before anyone looked up and took note, while keeping public attention with high-profile and popular whaling and nukes campaigns. In recent years it’s been putting a lot of resources into putting PNG logging and Pacific bottom-trawling on the map, investing capital in those issues now that the investment in climate has started to pay off and it seems ‘relevant’.
Not in any way denigrating the importance of air pollution, but it is one of very many environmental and social issues out there where people and animals are dying day by day. It definitely deserves higher priority, but then what gets shunted down when you have strictly limited resources?
I would argue that their opposition to nuclear power has not only been a waste of time, it has been actively destructive to the environment by encouraging additional coal usage. However, I’m not expecting to win that argument with you!
More seriously, whaling might get the punters excited, but in terms of global environmental issues (or, for that matter, animal welfare issues) it doesn’t even belong in the third rank.
Secondly, the amount of effort put into opposing GMOs is out of all proportion to the environmental risks they pose. Not all GMOs are created equal, either – some pose genuine reasons to worry, others aren’t a particularly big deal.
Some, indeed, are little more than what would be the result of a sped-up breeding programme.
To clarify, I was actually referring to the campaign against nuclear testing. However, we won’t get into the argument about nuclear power, as you say
Not here and now, anyway.
I wonder whether these sort of figures are more likely to prompt the Chinese Govt to do something about their emissions rather than trying to get them to sign up to reduction targets from a climate change perspective.
of course, its rather difficult to maintain their ‘deserved/allowed’ (the ‘developed’ world did it so why can’t we?) growth rates without the massive assoc. enviro and health costs.
surely india would be in a similar position too?
m
According to Spiegel the particles from China can be found as far away as Europe. The soup looks pretty thick in Shanxi province. Their photo essay is worth a look.
The BBC gives more info on life in Shanxi.
There is also a suggestion that the pollution promotes cloud formation, but inhibits rain and snow.
By googling ‘Asian brown cloud’ I found this NASA article with some interesting animation.
The Wikipedia entry says the brown cloud covers India, Pakistan, and parts of South Asia as well as China.
This article suggests that it is two miles thick, blocks 15% of the sunlight and causes half a million deaths in India each year (2002).
BilB says:
This graph from NASA GISS indicates that the worry is in taking out the negative forcing of the non-soot aerosols. I don’t know enough about the science to know how this relates to the pollution in China. Perhaps Robert might.