The drought in southwestern China has attracted much attention lately. Almost every year, the Chinese government lists investment in construction projects for hydraulic facilities used by farmlands as one of its major policies. In reality, however, they have been unsuccessful in effectively carrying out this policy.
Massive hydraulic construction projects still receive government financing, but over the last 30 years, there have been almost no upgrades to small reservoirs and irrigation canals in rural areas. Of the 4 trillion yuan (US$585.9 billion) the Chinese government invested in its domestic economy last year, only an extremely small portion was spent on hydraulic facilities for farmlands. This is directly responsible for rural areas’ inability to fight drought.
The huge sums of money invested by the Chinese government are basically aimed at things that can bring direct economic gain to local governments. A lot of these investments have in fact been disastrous for the environment and for ecological conservation.
For example, the rubber industry in Yunnan Province has always been one of the province’s main industries. From 1994 to 2007, the purchase price of unvulcanized rubber skyrocketed by 900 percent. However, tests from official geographic information systems have also shown that big rubber plantations have affected the climate in Yunnan, causing the average temperature in the region to increase by 0.4°C to 0.5°C over the last 10 years.
Furthermore, mass planting of eucalyptus trees is something that has started in China as the pulp and papermaking industries have developed. The People’s Government of Yunnan Province, in particular, has assisted companies in the paper industry to build up massive stocks of timber and these companies have acquired large areas of land, including mountain and forest areas.
In just a few years, 12.14 million hectares of eucalyptus trees and other fast-growing trees replaced the original natural forests and alpine vegetation. These large areas of eucalyptus trees have been called “green deserts” because there are no birds in the trees and no vegetation beneath them.
The negative effects on the environment of these plantations are being compared to that of massive hydropower development projects.
In other words, the aggressive economic development strategies of local governments are one of the main reasons why natural disasters are becoming more and more prevalent.
There is an even more serious problem behind these economic development strategies and that is the unequal distribution of water resources. In China, cities and industries receive more water resources than agricultural areas and farmers. When serious droughts last for months on end, it is the villages and peasants that are hurt the most.
The reason behind this situation is the unequal distribution of power and rights. In addition, farmers, including those who are affected by droughts, have no way of organizing groups to fight for their rights and are unable to make their demands known via regular channels.
This is a form of manmade disaster and it is something that the Chinese government is trying very hard to ignore and avoid taking responsibility for. This is a growing issue that we cannot afford to ignore any longer.
Wang Dan is a prominent figure in China’s democracy movement and holds a PhD in history from Harvard University.
TRANSLATED BY DREW CAMERON
Weeks into the craze, nobody quite knows what to make of the OpenClaw mania sweeping China, marked by viral photos of retirees lining up for installation events and users gathering in red claw hats. The queues and cosplay inspired by the “raising a lobster” trend make for irresistible China clickbait. However, the West is fixating on the least important part of the story. As a consumer craze, OpenClaw — the AI agent designed to do tasks on a user’s behalf — would likely burn out. Without some developer background, it is too glitchy and technically awkward for true mainstream adoption,
On Monday, a group of bipartisan US senators arrived in Taiwan to support the nation’s special defense bill to counter Chinese threats. At the same time, Beijing announced that Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) had invited Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Chairwoman Cheng Li-wun (鄭麗文) to visit China, a move to make the KMT a pawn in its proxy warfare against Taiwan and the US. Since her inauguration as KMT chair last year, Cheng, widely seen as a pro-China figure, has made no secret of her desire to interact with the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) and meet with Xi, naming it a
A delegation of Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) officials led by Chairwoman Cheng Li-wun (鄭麗文) is to travel to China tomorrow for a six-day visit to Jiangsu, Shanghai and Beijing, which might end with a meeting between Cheng and Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平). The trip was announced by Xinhua news agency on Monday last week, which cited China’s Taiwan Affairs Office (TAO) Director Song Tao (宋濤) as saying that Cheng has repeatedly expressed willingness to visit China, and that the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) Central Committee and Xi have extended an invitation. Although some people have been speculating about a potential Xi-Cheng
No state has ever formally recognized the Central Tibetan Administration (CTA) as a legal entity. The reason is not a lack of legitimacy — the CTA is a functioning exile government with democratic elections and institutions — but the iron grip of realpolitik. To recognize the CTA would be to challenge the People’s Republic of China’s territorial claims, a step no government has been willing to take given Beijing’s economic leverage and geopolitical weight. Under international law, recognition of governments-in-exile has precedent — from the Polish government during World War II to Kuwait’s exile government in 1990 — but such recognition
RSS