May 15 2008
enjoy the scenery in china while it lasts
Today is another break from the usual law and business stuff because of the quake, and also, I just needed a day to relax. The BBC ran an article last week entitled “Wild times in changing China” that talks about the natural treasures of China’s environment. However, with the rural migration to the cities, it seems like rice paddies may get wiped out and greater industrialization will jeopardize the environment.
China is a country that in some peoples’ minds has become synonymous with industrial pollution, rigid political control and spectacular economic expansion.
But behind this image lies another world which is the real, essential China - a place of vast shifting deserts, tropical coral reefs, steaming jungles, snow-capped peaks, evergreen forests and smoking volcanoes.
And surviving, tucked away within this incredibly diverse landscape, is a wealth of animal and plant life.
China is home to 534 species of mammals - one eighth of the world’s total, of which more than a hundred, including iconic creatures such as the giant panda, are endemic.
The country’s birdlife is also extremely rich, with more than 1,300 species, whilst there are more than 2,200 species of fishes.
China’s plant life is equally spectacular, with an amazing 32,800 species of higher plants, making China the third richest country in these terms after Malaysia and Brazil.
Rural demands
Experts are forecasting that in the next couple of decades, more than 300 million rural people will migrate to China’s Eastern seaboard in search of better-paid jobs.
Traditional farming systems, like the terraced rice paddies which cover the hillsides of southern China, require a huge amount of manual labour for planting, upkeep and harvesting.
As wage levels rise, such work is bound to become uneconomic, and without intensive management, the paddies will not survive the annual onslaught of monsoon rains for long.
At the same time, pressures to increase food production to meet increasing demands from a growing urban population, and to cope with the effluent produced by massive industrialisation and vast urban conurbations, will inevitably pose serious environmental challenges.
I have a feeling this is a tragic, but rather inevitable part of a growing economy. Why else would America put so much focus on natural parks and wildlife preserves if industry didn’t wipe out large chunks of the environment? I am actually not much of an environmentalist, so don’t get me wrong here. I am not saying let’s go back to pre-historic, pre-industrial society like a Luddite. I am just making an observation that it’s bound to happen, but am somewhat sad that the beautiful landscapes of China may be threatened by this. I hope green tech reaches China early enough to make a dent on this problem. But we can never really be certain it will.
And for all those who are only interested in touring/visiting China, make sure to check out the natural scenery while it is still beautiful.
