Abstract
This chapter considers the immediate forces influencing China’s food system and food security. By immediate is meant events of the reform period, from the late 1970s to 2009. It begins by asking the question that has preoccupied specialists since the publication of Lester Brown’s Who Will Feed China? in 1995: How much arable land does China have? Is that land area sufficient to insure grain sufficiency? To insure food security? The chapter focuses on the human pressures on the food production environment, and then treats the effects of socioeconomic change: land, air, and water degradation. The core of the chapter examines seven responses of the state to both perceived and actual environmental stressors: policy restricting arable land conversion, China’s one-child policy, investment in irrigation systems, large-scale dam construction, the South-North Water Diversion Project, large-scale afforestation and reforestation campaigns, and the program to convert marginal agricultural lands to forests and grasslands.
An earlier version of this chapter was published in the Journal of Chinese Political Studies, a Springer publication, entitled “Environmental Stressors and Food Security in China
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Notes
- 1.
State Statistical Bureau. China Statistics Yearbook. Beijing: China Statistics Press, 2005.
- 2.
Lester R. Brown, Who Will Feed China? New York: W.W. Norton, 1995.
- 3.
World Resources Institute, World Resources 1998–99. New York: Oxford University Press, 1999.
- 4.
Vaclav Smil, “Research Note: China’s Arable Land,” China Quarterly, 158 (June 1999), 414–29.
- 5.
The hectare is approximately 2.47 English acres. The mu (also spelled mou) is approximately one-fifteenth of a hectare. However, historically the mu has not been standardized. See Clifton W. Pannell and Runsheng Yin, “Diminishing Cropland and Agricultural Outlook,” in Chiao-min Hsieh and Max Lu, eds., Changing China: A Geographic Appraisal. Boulder, CO: Westview Press, 2004, 36.
- 6.
Smil, 1999, 417. See also China Development Brief, “Statistics: Seeking Truth from (Tonnes of) Facts.” Retrieved February 15, 2006 from: http://www.chinadevelopmentbrief.com
- 7.
Smil, 1999, 419; also see Chuanchun Wu, “Land Utilization,” in Geping Qu and Woyen Lee, eds., Managing the Environment in China. Dublin: Tycooly International, 1984; and Gerhard K. Heilig, “Anthropogenic Factors in Land-Use Change in China,” Population and Development Review, Vol. 23, no. 1 (1997), 142.
- 8.
Smil, 1999, 419–20.
- 9.
Smil, 1999, 423–24.
- 10.
National Bureau of Statistics, China Statistical Yearbook 2007. Beijing: China Statistics Press, 2007, 464.
- 11.
Fangchao Li, “Arable Land Bank Continues Decline,” China Daily, April 13, 2007, 3.
- 12.
Huanxin Zhao, “Bottom Line Set for Grain Production,” China Daily, August 4, 2006, 1.
- 13.
Chuanjiao Xie, “1.7m Hectares of Arable Land ‘by 2020’” China Daily, June 22, 2007, 2.
- 14.
Samuel P. S. Ho and George C. S. Lin, “Non-Agricultural Land Use in Post-Reform China,” China Quarterly, 179 (September 2004), 776.
- 15.
Susan Greenhalgh & Edwin A. Winckler, Governing China’s Population: From Leninist to Neoliberal Biopolitics. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 2005, 74.
- 16.
Ibid.
- 17.
See Judith Shapiro, Mao’s War Against Nature: Politics and the Environment in Revolutionary China. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2001, 37.
- 18.
This is an estimate only. Several sources predict that population will not peak at the 1.6 billion level until 2050.
- 19.
Chiao-min Hsieh, “Changes in the Chinese Population: Demography, Distribution, and Policy,” in Chiao-min Hsieh and Max Lu, eds., Changing China: A Geographic Appraisal. Boulder, CO: Westview Press, 2004, 204.
- 20.
Ho and Lin, 2004, 762.
- 21.
L. Wang, “The Degree, Characteristics, and Trends of China’s Urbanization,” People’s Daily, October 31, 1995, 4.
- 22.
Liping Di, “Land-Use Patterns and Land-Use Change,” in Chiao-min Hsieh and Max Lu, eds., Changing China: A Geographic Appraisal. Boulder, CO: Westview Press, 2004, 19.
- 23.
Ibid.
- 24.
Ho and Lin, 2004, 766. For a case study using different methods, see Guifen Liu and Chengtai Diao, “Current Situation of Cultivated Land Resources and Food Security in Jiangjin City,” in Yancui Liu, ed., Study of the Strategy of Land Resources and Regional Coordinated Development in China (in Chinese). Beijing: Meteorology Publishing Co., 2006.
- 25.
See Jikun Huang, Lifen Zhu, Xiangzheng Deng and Scott Rozelle, “Cultivated Land Changes in China: The Impacts of Urbanization and Industrialization,” Society of Photo-Optical Instrumentation Engineers, Vol. 584 (2005), 58840I 1–15.
- 26.
Anthony Gar-On Yeh and Xia Li, “An Integrated Remote Sensing and GIS Approach in the Monitoring and Evaluation of Rapid Urban Growth for Sustainable Development in the Pearl River Delta, China,” International Planning Studies, Vol. 2, no. 2 (1997), 193–210.
- 27.
Carolyn Cartier, “’Zone Fever,’ the Arable Land Debate, and Real Estate Speculation: China’s Evolving Land Use Regime and its Geographical Contradictions,” Journal of Contemporary China, Vol. 10, no. 28 (August 2001), 454–56.
- 28.
Cartier, 2001, 452.
- 29.
Ibid.
- 30.
Dali L. Yang, Beyond Beijing: Liberalization and the Regions in China. London: Routledge, 1997, 54–55.
- 31.
Jean Oi, Rural China Takes Off: Institutional Foundations of Economic Reform. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1999, 37.
- 32.
Fangchao Li, “Illegal Land Use Poses Major Threat,” China Daily, September 18, 2007, 1.
- 33.
Jiao Wu, “Land Loss Threatens Food Safety,” China Daily, December 26, 2007, 1.
- 34.
Zhiming Xin, Jing Fu, and Ping Zhu, “Security of Food Calls for Serious Thought,” China Daily, January 16, 2008, 7.
- 35.
Xu Wang, “Report Shows Real Price of Growth,” China Daily, September 12, 2008, 3.
- 36.
Xiaofeng Guan, “Experts Discuss Answers to Land Degradation,” China Daily, August 28, 2006, 2.
- 37.
Fangchao Li, “Ecological Degradation Continuing,” China Daily, June 5, 2006, 1.
- 38.
Jiao Wu, “Govt Targets Land Pollution,” China Daily, June 20, 2008, 3.
- 39.
One example of a recent study is: Yizong Huang, Zhixian Li, Xiangdon Li, Wenmiao Yang, Zhaoyong Liang, Huafeng Li, Dinglan Liu, and Bisheng Lu, “Effects of Acid Deposition and Atmospheric Pollution on Forest Ecosystem Biomass in Southern China” (in Chinese), Ecology and Environment, Vol. 16, no. 1 (2007), 60–65.
- 40.
Xinhua, “Erosion Threatening Grain Security,” China Daily, August 28, 2007, 2.
- 41.
Xinhua, “Xinjiang Losing Land to Soil Erosion,” China Daily, July 3, 2007, 4.
- 42.
Caixiong Zheng, “Soil Erosion Targeted in Guangdong,” China Daily, November 20, 2007, 4.
- 43.
Yu Xie, “Land Erosion ‘Threat to Food Supply’,” China Daily, November 23, 2008, 2.
- 44.
This figure differs from the 27 percent mentioned above, because the State Forestry Administration uses several different definitions for forest coverage.
- 45.
Scott Rozelle, Jikun Huang, and Vince Benziger, “Forest Exploitation and Protection in Reform China,” in Hyde, Belcher, and Xu, 2003, 20.
- 46.
Chao Liang, “Probe Launched into Erosion Threat,” China Daily, July 5, 2005, 2.
- 47.
Personal interview with forest ecologist, Beijing, May 18, 2004.
- 48.
Greenpeace China, Investigative Report on APP’s Forest Destruction in Yunnan. Hong Kong: November 2004.
- 49.
China Development Brief, “Greenpeace, Zhejiang Hotels, Stand Firm against Paper Giant,” March 31, 2005. Retrieved February 14, 2006 from: http://www.chinadevelopmentbrief.com/node/77/print Also, see Liang Chao and Cui Ning, “Authorities Crack Down on Illegal Logging,” China Daily, March 31, 2005, 2.
- 50.
Desheng Cao, “Nation Fighting Ever-Engulfing Deserts,” China Daily, June 18, 2004, 2.
- 51.
See Xiang-yun Li, Jun Yang, and Li-xin Wang, “Quantitative Analysis on the Driving Role of Human Activity on Land Desertification in an Arid Area: The Case of the Tarim River Basin (in Chinese),” Resources Science, Vol. 26, no. 5 (September 2004), 30–7.
- 52.
Lie Ma, “Water Rule Will Protect Great Wall, Gansu Oasis,” China Daily, August 7, 2007, 5.
- 53.
Shanshan Wang, “Creeping Desert Threatens Mogao Grottoes,” China Daily, November 6, 2007, 3. The Mogao caves are located in Dunhuang, Gansu province and are famous for their 1,000 year old Buddhist statutes and wall paintings. They are threatened by the encroaching Kumutage desert, China’s sixth largest.
- 54.
See Nianyong Han, Gaoming Jiang, and Wenjun Li, Management of the Degraded Ecosystems in Xilingol Biosphere Reserve (Chinese and English). Beijing: Tsinghua University Press, 2002, 120–34. See also Biodiversity Working Group of China Council for International Cooperation on Environment and Development, Restoring China’s Degraded Environment: The Role of Natural Vegetation. Beijing: 2001, 2–7.
- 55.
Xinhua, “10-year Plan Needed to Save Wetlands from Desert,” China Daily, September 18, 2007, 4.
- 56.
R. Gluckman, “The Desert Storm,” Asiaweek, October 13, 2000, 3–6. See also Lie Ma, “Desertification Threatens Northwest Areas,” China Daily, September 6, 200, 3; Weiyu Jiang and Fanglin Chan, “Controlling Desertification in North China” (in Chinese), Journal of Arid Land Resources and Environment, Vol. 26, no. 5 (September 2004), 30–37; and Qianzhao Gao, Jianjun Qu, Run Wang, Yuan Li, Ruiping Zu, and Kecun Zhang, “Impact of Ecological Water Transport to Green Corridor on Desertification Reversion at Lower Reaches of Tarim River” (in Chinese) Journal of Desert Research, Vol. 27, no. 1 (January 2007), 52–58.
- 57.
Huanxin Zhao, “Inner Mongolia’s Green Efforts aid Beijing,” China Daily, July 26, 2007, 3.
- 58.
Yong Wu, “Playing with Nature or Helping It Is the Question,” China Daily, August 22, 2007, 12.
- 59.
Xiaohua Sun, “Sandstorms a Fact of Nature,” China Daily, March 15, 2007, 6.
- 60.
Personal interview with government-organized NGO representative involved in desert control activities, Beijing, May 18, 2007.
- 61.
Guolan Liao and Chao Wu, Heavy Metal Pollution and Control in Mining Environment (in Chinese). Changsha, Hunan: Central South University Press, 2005.
- 62.
Yang Yang, “Pesticides and Environmental Health Trends in China,” Woodrow Wilson Center, China Environmental Forum, 2007.
- 63.
Fangchan Li, “Official: More than 10% of Arable Land Polluted,” China Daily, April 23, 2007, 1. Also see Xinhua, “Bitter Harvest,” China Daily, May 19, 2008, 3.
- 64.
Xiaohua Sun, “SEPA Sets Sights on Polluted Soil,” China Daily, January 9, 2008, 3.
- 65.
Xiaohua Sun, “Soil Survey to Monitor Pollution,” China Daily, May 9, 2007, 1.
- 66.
Li Liu, “One Third of Nation Hit by Acid Rain,” China Daily, August 28, 2006, 2. In Guangzhou, eight out of every 10 rainfalls were acidic in 2007; see Hong Chen, “Guangzhou Swamped by Acid Rain,” China Daily, March 28, 2008, 4. China is a major source of transboundary air pollution reaching its neighbors. Even in Los Angeles, city officials estimate that on some days, one-quarter of the city’s smog comes from China. See Doug Struck, Washington Post National Weekly Edition, February 25–March 2, 2008, 10.
- 67.
Chong Wu, “Researchers: Polluted Air Causes less Rainfall,” China Daily, March 9, 2007, 3.
- 68.
Chuanjiao Xie, “Pollution Makes Cancer the Top Killer,” China Daily, May 21, 2007, 1.
- 69.
Joseph Kahn and Jim Yardley, “As China Roars, Pollution Reaches Deadly Extremes,” New York Times, August 26, 2007, A13.
- 70.
Xiaohua Sun, “SEPA Publishes Q1 Report,” China Daily, May 22, 2007, 3.
- 71.
Jiao Wu, “Pollution Picture to Brighten,” China Daily, June 6, 2007, 1. NGO activity targeting air pollution became more public in 2007–08. Ma Jun, author of China’s Water Crisis and head of the Institute of Public and Environmental Affairs, set up a China Air Pollution Map to mirror the China Water Pollution Map. Its blacklist in late 2007 included 40 multinational corporations among 4,000 firms on the roll. See Zhuoqiong Wang, “Global Giants on Pollution Blacklist,” China Daily, December 14, 2007, 1. Too, regulation of vehicle traffic and moving highly polluting industrial plants out of town did clean up Beijing’s air for the 2008 Olympics; some of these measures may become permanent. See Zhe Zhu, “Nothing but ‘Blue Skies’ from Now On,” China Daily, August 20, 2008, 3; Zhe Zhu and Ying Wang, “Clean Air Measures to Remain after Games,” China Daily, August 24, 2008, 2; and Xiaohuo Cui, “Clear Days’ Target Met Before Time,” China Daily, December 1, 2008, 3.
- 72.
Jing Li, “Slow Progress,” China Daily, July 20, 2008, 4.
- 73.
Xiaohua Sun, “Pollution Problems Serious: Survey,” China Daily, January 19, 2009, 2. Respondents rated the effectiveness of environmental protection as 52 points (with 1 being lowest) as compared to 58 in 2007 and 68 in 2006. In other words, perceptions of protective efforts had declined.
- 74.
Lester R. Brown, “China’s Water Shortage Could Shake World Food Security,” World Watch, July 1, 1998. See also, China Development Brief, “Thirsty Cities and Factories Push Farmers Off the Parched Earth,” June 1, 2001. For a generic response to Brown’s argument, see Jianxin Xu, Zezhong Zhang, and Fa Liu, “The Analysis of the Water Resource’s Assurance of Grain Production Security” (in Chinese), Water Conservancy Science and Technology and Economy, Vol. 11, no. 10 (October 2005), 611–14; and Bryan Lohmar and Jinxia Wang, “Will Water Scarcity Affect Agricultural Production in China?” in China’s Food and Agriculture: Issues for the 21st Century. Washington, DC: Economic Research Service, USDA, 2003, 41–43.
- 75.
Jennifer Turner & Kenji Otsuka, Reaching Across the Water. Washington, DC: China Environment Forum, Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars, 2006, 1.
- 76.
Bryan Lohmar, Jinxia Wang, Scott Rozelle, Jikun Huang, and David Dawe, “China’s Agricultural Water Policy Reforms,” Economic Research Service, Agriculture Information Bulletin, no. 782 (2003), 1. Also see Renee Vassilos, Tanya Franke and Jorge Sanchez, Water Situation in the North China Plain. Beijing: USDA Foreign Agricultural Service, Global Agriculture Information Network, 2008.
- 77.
Lie Ma, “Shaanxi Reels from Drought,” China Daily, May 11, 2007, 50.
- 78.
Jun Ma, China’s Water Crisis. Norwalk, CT: Eastbridge, 2004, vii.
- 79.
Jim Yardley, “China’s Path to Modernity, Mirrored in a Troubled River,” New York Times, November 19, 2006, A1, 14–15.
- 80.
As a number of studies have indicated, the crop structure of regions in the North China Plain, affecting the amount of water consumed through irrigation systems, strongly influences water sufficiency prospects. See, for example, Yongsong Liao and Jikun Huang, “Impact of Crop Structure Change on Irrigation Water Demand in the Basins of Yellow River, Huahe River and Haihe River,” Journal of China Institute of Water Resources and Hydropower Research (in Chinese), Vol. 2, no. 3 (September 2004), 184–88.
- 81.
Brown, 1998, 2.
- 82.
Turner & Otsuka, 2006, 3.
- 83.
Personal interview with water engineer, Beijing, May 15, 2007.
- 84.
Lohmar, et al., 2003, 17.
- 85.
Most of the analyses suggest that incentive systems and not the development of new water management institutions are most likely to produce water savings. See Jinxia Wang, Zhigang Xu, Jikun Huang, and Scott Rozelle, “Incentives in Water Management Reform: Assessing the Effect on Water Use, Production, and Poverty in the Yellow River Basin,” Environment and Development Economics, Vol. 10 (2005), 769–99.
- 86.
Jing Fu, “High Prices to ‘Persist’ Next Year,” China Daily, September 18, 2007, 2.
- 87.
Based on personal interviews with officials of the Ministry of Water Resources, professors of hydrology, and NGO representatives, Beijing, March 15, 22, May 18, 22, 30, 2007.
- 88.
Chuanjiao Xie, “Pollution Makes Cancer the Top Killer,” China Daily, May 21, 2007, 1. Environmental degradation also has been linked to birth defects, which increased by nearly 40 percent between 2001 and 2009. See Yinan Hu, “Rural Environmental Protection Plan Released,” China Daily, November 22, 2007, 5. Also see Jia Chen, “Birth Defects Soar Due to Pollution,” China Daily, February 1, 2009, 2. (The article estimated that 10 percent of the physical defects in Chinese infants were caused by environmental pollution.) The health effects of contaminated water are both direct and indirect. Farmed fish raised in contaminated waters may lead to higher rates of cancer as well as liver disease and other afflictions. See David Barboza, “In China, Farming Fish in Toxic Waters,” New York Times, December 15, 2007. Eel farmers called the Times accusation that fish farmers had mixed illegal veterinary drugs and pesticides into fish feed “totally groundless.” Local environmental protection bureau officials said strict regulations since 2003 had made drug use illegal, and that “The major pollutants in eel breeding are nitrogen, phosphorous and excrement which are found naturally” and that 97 percent of aquatic products met standards during random tests.” See Yinan Hu and Jiao Wu, “Fishing in ‘Troubled Waters’ Leads to Big Losses,” China Daily, January 3, 2008, 1.
- 89.
Xinhua, “Volume of Pollutants Exceeds 13m Tons,” China Daily, May 11, 2007, 4.
- 90.
Fangchao Li, “Provincial Officials Promise to Close Loopholes,” China Daily, May 11, 2007, 4.
- 91.
Fangchan Li, “Rehabilitation Effort for Country’s Dirtiest Waterway to Last a Decade,” China Daily, May 11, 2007, 4. For a review of the incident and analysis of the flawed response capability of central and regional authorities, see Nat Green, “Positive Spillover? Impact of the Songhua River Benzene Incident on China’s Environmental Policy,” Woodrow Wilson Center, China Environmental Forum, 2009.
- 92.
Xiaohua Sun, “SEPA Publishes Q1 Report,” China Daily, May 22, 2007, 3. The Huaihe River is China’s third longest and stretches through Henan, Anhui, Jiangsu, and Shandong provinces. In early 2008, wastewater treatment plants treated just 60 percent of daily wastewater from industrial plants and households. Its chemical oxygen demand level was still 80 percent higher than the accepted standard, and a Ministry of Environmental Protection report faulted provincial governments for inadequate pollution monitoring and enforcement. See Xiaohua Sun, “3 Provinces Fail on River Targets,” China Daily, April 22, 2008, 4.
- 93.
Xiaohua Sun, “Polluters Face Stiff Penalties,” China Daily, August 27, 2007, 1.
- 94.
Zhuoqiong Wang, “River is 10% Sewage: Official,” China Daily, May 11, 2007, 4.
- 95.
Ibid.
- 96.
Lie Ma, “Shaanxi Tackles River Pollution,” China Daily, May 15, 2007, 5.
- 97.
Xiaohua Sun, “Pollution Takes Heavy Toll on Yangtze,” China Daily, April 16, 2007, 1.
- 98.
The white-fin dolphin, with a history of 20 million years along the Yangtze, has practically died out because of pollution and over-fishing. See Liu Xiao, “Swift Action Needed to Save Yangtze, Forum Says,” China Daily, September 18, 2007, 3.
- 99.
Xinhua News Service, “Sepa to Get Tough on Gov’t Violations,” China Daily, March 2, 2007, 3. Industrial pollution even reached the Three Gorges Dam area in mid-2008, which was the first time a blue-green algae outbreak had occurred there. See Xiaohua Sun, “Algae Infests River near Dam,” China Daily, July 22, 2008, 3 and Jing Li, “Concerns Remain over Water Safety,” China Daily, December 25, 2008, 4.
- 100.
Xiaohua Sun, “Yangtze and Pearl River Estuaries Now ‘Dead Zones’,” China Daily, October 20, 2006, 2.
- 101.
Kun Zhang, “Experts Identify Algae Afflicting Taihu Lake,” China Daily, June 13, 2007, 4; also see Fangchao Li, “Official Warns of Major Algae Outbreak,” China Daily, July 14–15, 2007, 3; and Na He, “Blue Algae Hits City’s Water Supply,” China Daily, July 18, 2007, 4, for a report of an outbreak of blue algae in the water supply of Changchun in northeast China. For analysis of the problems in environmental governance reflected in the Taihu case, see Pei-yu “Catherine” Tai and Linden Ellis, “Taihu: Green Wash or Green Clean?” Woodrow Wilson Center, China Environmental Forum, 2008.
- 102.
Lifei Zheng and Huanxin Zhao, “Water Better, But Not Drinkable,” China Daily, June 2–3, 2007, l. An environmental activist who protested the impact of the chemical industry in the pollution of Lake Tai sought retribution from the government. See Joseph Kahn, “In China, a Lake’s Champion Imperils Himself,” New York Times, October 14, 2007. Five of the nine “Green Chinese,” winners of environmental awards sponsored by seven ministries in 2007 won the prizes because of their service in reducing water pollution, including Zhang Xiaojian, who treated polluted water of Lake Tai in Wuxi. See Zhuoqiong Wang, “Turning Back the Tide,” China Daily, December 31, 2007, 8. Despite these actions, water in Lake Tai remained polluted the following year. See Yanfang Qian, “Taihu Lake Water Safety Fears Remain,” China Daily, May 30, 2008, 6.
- 103.
Turner & Otsuka, 2006, 4; also see Zhuqing Jiang, “Groundwater Quality ‘Deteriorating’,” China Daily, October 10, 2006, 2.
- 104.
Xiaohua Sun, “SEPA Publishes Q1 Report,” China Daily, May 22, 2007, 3.
- 105.
Hong Chen, “Guangdong Water Woes ‘to Worsen’,” China Daily, November 28, 2007, 5. This region too was afflicted by algae blooms. See Qiwen Liang, “Algae Blooms Watched,” China Daily, December 28, 2007, 4.
- 106.
Jiao Wu and Fangchao Li, “Rural Water Woes to be Addressed,” China Daily, August 23, 2007, 1. Also see Jing Li, “China Cleans Up Countryside,” China Daily, April 13, 2009, 6 and “Rivers Need to be Cleaned Up,” China Daily, September 24, 2009, 3.
- 107.
For example, in 2007 SEPA announced that it was launching an automated system to closely monitor key polluters, who account for 65 percent of the country’s industrial waste (in response to environmental activists who complained that many industrial plants shut off expensive sewage disposal facilities after SEPA inspections and resumed dumping wastes into rivers). The agency claimed it had reached a “turning point” in this year because the rate of increase in pollutant discharges increased at a slower rate than in the previous year. See: Xinhua, “Big Polluters Face Strict Monitoring,” China Daily, May 11, 2007, 4, and Jiao Wu, “Pollution Picture to Brighten,” China Daily, June 6, 2007, 1.
- 108.
In 2007, SEPA reported that despite an increase in funding on pollution control, amounting to 1.23 percent of China’s GDP, “China is under increasing pressure to cope with environmental pollution.” Of 842 pollution accidents reported for 2006, more than half were water related. Moreover, half the country’s population lived in an environment where sewage was not treated. Orders from SEPA to reduce pollution routinely were disregarded by some cities. See Xinhua, “Spending Failing to Solve Pollution Problems,” China Daily, September 25, 2007, 4, and Dingding Xin, “278 Cities Suffer Untreated Sewage,” China Daily, August 31, 2007, 3.
- 109.
Personal interview with Senior Engineer, Institute of Water Resources, Beijing, May 30, 2007.
- 110.
Xiaohua Sun, “Drinking Water Gets Top Priority in New Plan,” China Daily, November 27, 2007, 3. SEPA official Shengxian Zhou gave an optimistic projection, claiming that “the quality of China’s key drinking water resources should meet national standards by next year.” He also believed that pollution of waterways would decline: “The ecological system should maintain a virtuous circle and all rivers should flow calmly along their natural course.” See Wutai Zhu, “SEPA Chief Outlines Vision for Clean Drinking Water.” China Daily, November 22, 2007, 5. It seems unlikely that either goal will be realized without greater government coordination and enforcement actions. The immediate plan was to inaugurate the first national pollution census to examine sources of industrial, agricultural and residential pollution without, however, linking results to either punishment or evaluation of derelict officials. See Xiaohua Sun, “1st National Pollution Census Starts,” China Daily, January 5–6, 2008, 1.
- 111.
Jing Li, “41b Flows into County sewage Facilities,” China Daily, November 18, 2008, 6.
- 112.
Jing Li, “China Cleans Up Countryside,” China Daily, May 13, 2009, 6.
- 113.
Jingyuan Li and Jingjing Liu, “Quest for Clean Water in China’s Newly Amended Water Pollution Control Law,” Woodrow Wilson Center, China Environmental Forum, 2009.
- 114.
Xiaohua Sun, “10% of GDP Now Comes from Sea, Says Report,” China Daily, April 10, 2007, 4.
- 115.
John Mackinnon, Mang Sha, Catherine Cheung, Geoff Carey, Zhu Xiang and David Melville, A Biodiversity Review of China. Hong Kong: World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF) International, 495.
- 116.
Personal interview with NGO representative, Beijing, January 11, 2005.
- 117.
Personal interview with official, State Oceanic Administration (SOA), Beijing, January 1, 2006. A SOA report issued in August 2007 and based on more than 500 pollution outlets monitored by the agency found that 77 percent of the outlets were discharging more pollutants than permitted, some 18 percent more than in the previous year. See Xiaohua Sun, “Offshore Water Quality Deteriorates,” China Daily, August 4–5, 2007, 2.
- 118.
Jonathan Yeung, “Red Tide Returns to Shenzhen Coastal Area,” China Daily, June 7, 2007, 4.
- 119.
Quanlin Qiu, “Pearl River Waste Harming the Sea,” China Daily, July 25, 2007, 5.
- 120.
Xinhua, “Official Vows to Cut Offshore Pollution,” China Daily, February 26, 2008, 4.
- 121.
This discussion follows Ho and Lin, 2004, 776–78.
- 122.
Ibid., 778.
- 123.
Cartier, 2001, 466–69.
- 124.
Huanxin Zhao, “No Yielding on Arable Land: Minister,” China Daily, July 13, 2007, 1.
- 125.
Fangchao Li, “Arable Land Bank Continues Decline,” China Daily, April 13, 2007, 3.
- 126.
Jing Fu, “Land Plan to Preserve Countryside,” China Daily, September 25, 2007, 1, 2.
- 127.
Fangchao Li, “Minimum Land Bank to Stay in Effect,” China Daily, June 26, 2007, 3. A State Council regulation of 2008 required greater cooperation among land survey participants, and it further tightened penalties for falsifying or distorting information. See Dingding Xin, “Authentic Land Data Promised,” China Daily, February 28, 2008, 3.
- 128.
Fangchao Li, “Protection of Arable Land Banks a Joint Responsibility: Minister,” China Daily, July 13, 2007,4.
- 129.
Fangchao Li, “Illegal Land Use Poses Major Threat,” China Daily, September 18, 2007, 1. Nearly half of the rural protests in China were triggered by illegal land seizures or expropriations. The State Council ordered local governments to raise compensation for farmers losing land to development projects, as one means to address protests; increasing enforcement of land law violators including local government officials is another. See: Huanxin Zhao, “Farmers’ Protests Decline Sharply,” China Daily, January 31, 2007, 1. Some 22,000 cases of illegal land use covering more than 328,720 hectares were reported between January 2005 and September 2006. Late in the next year, land inspectors in the Ministry of Land and Resources ran a 100-day campaign to detect major rule violators, catching a few local government officials. See Jiao Wu, “Crackdown on Illegal Land Use,” China Daily, December 11, 2007, 3. The ministry promised to station inspectors in every province as part of a pilot project to curb illegal land acquisitions involving local authorities. See Jiao Wu, “Illegal Land Use in Cross Hairs of New Nationwide Scheme,” China Daily, February 2–3, 2008, 3.
- 130.
For example, authorities in Jilin Province expected to increase rice output through converting large areas of salina lands to paddy fields. The plan was to make the salt-encrusted land arable by flooding it with nearby river water. See Xinhua, “Salt Lands May Offer Solution to Land Shortage Problem,” China Daily, December 27, 2007, 3.
- 131.
Chuanjiao Xie, “1.7m Hectares of Additional Arable Land ‘by 2020’,” China Daily, June 22, 2007, 2.
- 132.
Jiao Wu, “Arable Land Reserves Continue to Decline,” China Daily, April 17, 2008, 3.
- 133.
Jiao Wu, “Policy Thrust on Saving Arable Land,” China Daily, August 14, 2008, 2.
- 134.
Jiao Wu, “New Measures to Protect Farmland,” China Daily, September 10, 2008, 2.
- 135.
Jiao Wu, “Enough Land Pledged for Booster Plan,” China Daily, November 14, 2008, 2.
- 136.
Qian Wang, “Stimulus Sops Up Farmland,” China Daily, December 31, 2008, 3.
- 137.
Yanfeng Qian, “Stimulus Spending ‘Could Aid’ Environmental Protection,” China Daily, December 11, 2008, 4.
- 138.
Jing Li, “Green Light Given to 153 New Projects,” China Daily, January 10, 2009, 10. Also see Xinhua, “Arable Land ‘Must Not be Misused’ ” China Daily, December 4, 2008, 4.
- 139.
Xinhua, “Farmers Get Lee way on Use of Land,” China Daily, October 20, 2008, 1; Jiao Wu, “Major Farmland Reforms Mulled,” China Daily, October 8, 2008, 3; and Edward Wong, “China May Let Peasants Sell Rights to Farmland,” New York Times, October 11, 2008, A1.
- 140.
Xinhua, “Move to Minimize Disputes over Land Use,” China Daily, October 11, 2008, A1.
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Tony Saich, Governance and Politics in China. New York: Palgrave, 2004, 246–68. For a critical perspective see Susan Greenhalgh, “Missile Science, Population Science: The Origins of China’s One-Child Policy,” China Quarterly, 182 (June 2005), 253–76, and Greenhalgh and Winkler, 2005. Also, party officials, celebrities, and the rich have ignored the policy, and enforcement has had little effect in deterring this in recent years. See Xinhua, “Hubei Luminaries Fined for Flouting Family Rules,” China Daily, January 2, 2008, 5 and Juan Shan, “Rich Flout Family Planning,” China Daily, June 22, 2009, 1.
- 142.
Chuanjiao Xie, “Baby Boom Set to Start Next Year,” China Daily, December 12, 2007, 3.
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Zhigang Xing, “Population Policy Will Stay for Now,” China Daily, March 10, 2008, 1.
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Jun Ma, 2004, ix.
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Economy, 2004, 205–08.
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Ibid., 208.
- 150.
Xinhua, “Three Gorges Project ‘Not to Blame’ for Severe Drought,” China Daily, August 19–20, 2006, 2; and Xiaofeng Guan, “’Dam Not Responsible for Drought’,” China Daily, October 24, 2006, 1.
- 151.
Jim Yardley, “Chinese Dam Projects Criticized for Their Human Costs,” New York Times, November 19, 2007; see also Xinhua, “Gov’t Tackling Three Gorges’ Hidden Environmental Threats,” China Daily, September 27, 2007, 3.
- 152.
See China Daily reports by Jiao Wu, “Ecology Damage Reports Refuted,” October 19, 2007, 1; Xinhua, “Dam ‘No Threat’ to Environment,” November 16, 2007, 3; Jiao Wu, “Three Gorges Project ‘Under Control’’,” November 28, 2007, 3; and Jiao Wu, “Dam Impact Less than Predicted,” China Daily, November 22, 2007, 1.
- 153.
Chris Buckley, “China Three Gorges Dam Faces New $25 Billion Bill,” Reuters AlertNet, November 19, 2009.
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See Gerald A. McBeath and Tse-Kang Leng, Governance of Biodiversity Conservation in China and Taiwan. Cheltenham, UK: Edward Elgar, 2006, 1–2, 208–15.
- 155.
Ibid., 2.
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State Council, Construction Committee of the South-North Water Diversion Project, China South-to-North Water Diversion Project. Beijing, 2004, 15.
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Ibid., 21. For example, pollution in the Huai River poses a threat to diversion of water from the south to the north. See Xiaohua Sun, “Polluters Face Stiff Penalties,” China Daily, August 27, 2007, 1.
- 158.
Personal communication to the authors from TJ Cheng, October 8, 2007.
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See Economy, 2004, 126.
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Runsheng Yin, Jintao Xu, Zhou Li, and Can Liu, “China’s Ecological Rehabilitation: The Unprecedented Efforts and Dramatic Impacts of Reforestation and Slope Protection in Western China,” Woodrow Wilson Center, China Environment Series, Issue 7, 2005, 19. Also see Tianjie Ma, “Interconnected Forests: Global and Domestic Impacts of China’s Forestry Conservation,” Woodrow Wilson Center, China Environmental Forum, 2008.
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China Daily, “Afforestation Tops Priority List among Former Loggers,” June 10, 1998, 3.
- 162.
China has planted 53.3 million hectares of forests since 1949, more than any other country in the world, with forest coverage rising from 8.6 percent to 18.2 percent. (Again, percentage of forest coverage varies by SFA definitions.) See Xiaohua Sun, “More Nature Reserves to Protect Forests,” China Daily, December 5, 2007, 4. and Chao Liang, “China 2020: A Greener and Leaner Landscape,” China Daily, August 1, 2005, 2.
- 163.
James Harkness, “Recent Trends in Forestry and Conservation of Biodiversity in China,” China Quarterly, 156 (December 1998), n. 51, 924.
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Personal interview with forestry manager, State Forestry Administration, Beijing, May 18, 2004.
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Yin et al., 2005, 28–30.
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Jing Fu, “Forest Reform on Horizon,” China Daily, August 16, 2007, 3.
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Zhigang Xu, M. T. Bennett, Ran Tao and Jintao Xu, “China’s Sloping Land Conversion Programme Four Years on: Current Situation and Pending Issues,” International Forestry Review, Vol. 6, nos. 3–4 (2004), 317.
- 168.
J. T. Xu and Y. Y. Cao, “Converting Steep Cropland to Forest and Grassland: Efficiency and Prospects of Sustainability” (in Chinese), International Economic Review, no. 2, 56–60; also see Yin et al., 2005, 22–23. The importance of economic compensation for farmers’ support of the SLCP is presented in Ling Zhi, Nuyun Li, Juan Wang, and Fanbin Kong, “A Discussion on the Economic Compensation System for Conversion of Cropland to Forestland in Western China” (in Chinese), Scientia Silvae Sinicae, Vol. 40, no. 2 (March 2004), 1–8.
- 169.
Xu et al., 2004, 117.
- 170.
See Jintao Xu, Ran Tao, and Zhigang Xu, “Sloping Land Conversion Program: Cost-effectiveness, Structural Effect and Economic Sustainability” (in Chinese), China Economic Quarterly, Vol. 4, no. 1 (October 2004), 160.
- 171.
Ministry of Land and Resources, 2003 China National Report on Land and Resources. Beijing, 2004.
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Zhigang Xu, Jintao Xu, Xiangzheng Deng, Jikun Huang, Emi Uchida and Scott Rozelle, “Grain for Green versus Grain: Conflict between Food Security and Conservation Set-Aside in China,” World Development, Vol. 34, no. 1 (2006), 130–48; see also, Xiangzheng Deng, Jikun Huang, Scott Rozelle, and Emi Uchida, “Cultivated Land Conversion and Potential Agricultural Productivity in China,” Land Use Policy, Vol. 23 (2006), 372–84. For a study of the impact of converting cropland to grassland, see Yongzhong Su and Peixi Su, “Ecological Effects of Converting Crops to Grass in the Marginal Lands of Linze Oasis in the Middle of Heihe River Basin,” in Liu, ed., 2006, 445–50. Also, personal interview with former staff member, Chinese Academy of Forestry, Beijing, May 21, 2007.
- 173.
Personal interview with policy analyst, CAS, Beijing, May 25, 2007.
- 174.
Yong Wu, “Reforestation Plan Put on Hold,” China Daily, September 12, 2007, 2.
- 175.
See Xiaohua Sun, “Tree Plan Being Retooled,” China Daily, September 20, 2007, 3; and Xiaohua Sun, “Returning Farmland to Forests to Protect Income, Farmers Told,” China Daily, October 11, 2007, 2.
- 176.
State Council, “Notification on the Completion of the Tuigeng Huanlin Policy,” August 9, 2007.
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Jeff Bennett, Xuehong Wang, and Lei Zhang, Environmental Protection in China: Land-Use Management. Cheltenham, UK: Edward Elgar, 2008. See especially chapters. 8–9, 196–220.
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Xinhua, “Grain Yield Exceeds 500m Ton,” China Daily, December 24, 2007, 3. This was the fourth consecutive year of increase in grain output, and it allowed China to meet 95 percent of domestic demand. A shortage in production was not expected until 2010. See Ying Wang, “Country is Able to Meet Grain Needs,” China Daily, November 22, 2007, 3. However, rising global grain prices and shortages of corn and soybeans spurred grain officials to eliminate the export tax rebates on major grains. Also, the State Council enacted an export tax on grains both to insure adequacy of domestic supply and curb food price inflation. See Diao Ying, “Grain Export Tax Rebate Dumped,” China Daily, December 18, 2007, 13; Diao Ying, “Gov’t Sets Export Tariff on Grains,” China Daily, January 2, 2008, 14; and Jiao Wu, “Tight Supply May Hit Grain Stability,” China Daily, January 4, 2008, 4.
- 179.
An official of the Ministry of Land and Resources indicated that Wen’s statement did not reflect policy of the State Council, which did not believe that the cited amount of land needed to be retained in the arable land category (personal interview, Beijing, May 27, 2007). A land resources researcher at a university land management institute opined that Wen’s statement was “a slogan,” designed to outline a conservative approach (personal interview, Beijing, May 23, 2007).
- 180.
See Jikun Huang, “Is China’s Grain Security Facing Great Challenge?” (in Chinese), Science & Technology Review, (2004), 17. See also Jiao Wu, “Ministry Forecasts Bumper Harvest,” China Daily, July 12, 2007, 3; and Jing Fu, “Agriculture Chief Has Thought for Food and Plenty on His Plate,” China Daily, October 15, 2007, supplement 1.
- 181.
See, for example, Chao Zheng, Zongwen Liao, Kexing Liu, and Xiaoyun Mao, “Effects of Fertilizer on Agriculture and Environment” (in Chinese) Ecology and Environment, Vol. 13, no. 1 (2004), 134–38; Shukui Tan and Buzhuo Peng, “Examination of Cultivated Land Utilization to Guarantee our Grain Security” (in Chinese) Economic Geography, Vol. 23, no. 3 (May 2003), 371–74.
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Ying Wang, “Hi-tech Measures to Increase Grain Yield,” China Daily, July 17, 2007, 3.
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McBeath, J.H., McBeath, J. (2010). Immediate Environmental Stressors on Food Security. In: Environmental Change and Food Security in China. Advances in Global Change Research, vol 35. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4020-9180-3_3
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