For the untold thousands of bureaucrats in the Chinese Communist Party, a cardinal rule of political self-preservation might be this: best not stand out too much, certainly not in public. A government official marching too far ahead of the parade of acceptable opinion runs the risk of finding himself dangerously alone.
So it is always a surprise to see what comes out when Pan Yue opens his mouth, as he did one afternoon this summer at his office at the State Environmental Protection Administration.
PHOTO: NEW YORK TIMES
The afternoon sky was clotted with the usual soup of haze and pollution as Pan ticked off one doomsday statistic after another.
Acid rain, he says, now falls over two-thirds of China's land mass. Of 340 major Chinese cities surveyed last year, 60 percent had serious air pollution problems.
In China's seven major waterways, pollution is so severe that vast stretches are not suitable for fish.
"Problems that were supposed to be future problems are now problems in the present," warned Pan, 44, as he smoked a cigarette.
If he is blunt in identifying the problems, he sounds almost radical in offering a solution: China must change the way it is developing to prevent an environmental crisis and a depletion of natural resources. Environmental protection must become a national priority.
And, for good measure, public participation must be encouraged -- the sort of language that in China usually means more democracy.
"The pressures China is now facing simply can't be sustained, the population and resource pressures," Pan said. "They cannot be ignored."
National stature
Well known for years in intellectual circles, the outspoken Pan has become a national figure in a country where environmental awareness is rising, even as environmental degradation is widespread and severe. His job as a deputy director of China's top environmental agency, if low down the totem pole of power in China, has given him a bully pulpit to help put environmentalism on the agenda -- apparently with the silent blessing of higher leaders.
"He's considered much more outspoken, much more specific," said Edward Norton, head of the Nature Conservancy in China. "He's definitely out front, much more than anybody in that agency or the other resource management agencies."
Pan, who has dark, spiky hair and looks a bit like a Chinese version of the Canadian actor Mike Myers, is quoted so often in the Chinese press that he has become the de facto spokesman of the environmental agency. If he were a US bureaucrat, he might be considered a media hound. In China, he is a rarity.
"I've always been known as a very frank speaker," said Pan, smiling.
Environmentalists in China have long worried, and warned, that a day of reckoning is coming. Historically, China has never put much emphasis on environmental protection. Yet a quarter-century of unbridled economic growth has brought not only new wealth but a legacy of blackened rivers, grossly polluted skies and dwindling natural resources.
But top officials like President Hu Jintao (
He came to the environmental agency in March last year after a 20-year government career, much of it working as a journalist at different state-controlled newspapers. The environmental agency had -- indeed, it still has -- a reputation as well-intentioned but often powerless.
Pan has called for more power for regulators. He said the current system is designed so that local environmental officials often report only to local authorities -- not to the central agency. He said those officials often disregard concerns about pollution to push for economic growth, at any cost.
"The serious problem we're facing is not lack of people," Pan said. "More important is we need the laws and power to enforce environmental protection. This requires systemic reform."
He has pushed for aggressive exploration of new energy sources, noting that China's growing dependence on coal is environmentally unsustainable. He wants tax penalties on heavier polluting industries and tax rewards for industries that conserve. And in October, environmental officials will begin preparations for trying out the so-called "green" gross domestic product, a new formulation that would reflect environmental costs in calculating economic growth.
A pilot program in certain cities and provinces will begin next year.
Whether it will all result in nothing more than a lot of words, or the beginning of real action, remains to be seen.
Engineer's son
Born in Jiangsu Province, Pan is the son of an engineer general in the People's Liberation Army. He considers himself a member of China's intellectual class as well as a government official, and his early work in media jibed neatly with his appetite for issues and debate.
In his latest post, Pan seems to understand the shock value of saying in public what many Chinese environmentalists, and even some officials, are saying in private.
He has pushed for greater grass-roots activism and helped the environmental agency organize student groups at 174 universities.
He said such public activism, as well as new government policies, are essential for China's future. "There's not a third road on this issue that is available to China," he says.
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