Environmental Governance In China

Implementation of Environmental Governance in China

Introduction

What China had paid for economic development? It is environment damage. By the end of the 20th and beginning of the 21st centuries. There was an explosive growth in China’s economy. The government policies encouraged the privatization of agriculture, the wholesale urbanization of China’s rural population, the development of tens of thousands of small-scale rural industries and an influx of international investment. The results have been staggering: hundreds of millions of Chinese have been lifted out of poverty; China’s economy continues to grow at a rate of 8–12 per cent annually, as it has for two decades and by the end of 2005, China was the fourth largest economy and third

Few local officials paid attention to environmental protection laws, secure in the knowledge that environmental protection laws, secure in the knowledge that environmental protection was not a central priority, and focused instead on raising the economic standards of their local citizens. Moreover, the imbalance between the rate of environmental degradation and pollution and the country’s capacity to respond was both understood and accepted by many (Bhatnagar, 2014). When local officials are chosen, they are measured by the economic growth in their localities. With this expectation, the environment is further neglected, as all resources are put in projects that yield economic growth. “For a lower-level cadre to receive his bonus and to have a chance at promotion, the most important thing to do is to please the party secretary at the next higher level”82, and in essence, put the well-being of citizens on the back burner. With emphasis placed on these statistics, local officials lack incentives to invest in pollution control (Fewsmith,

The growth of economy, it had needs to produce different kinds of goods. It is result to increase the consumption of energy in the industrial sectors. The industrial sector makes up a large portion of the total energy consumption. The increasing demand for more energy in China has led to shortages in domestic coal and oil supplies. Energy efficiency first became a priority in the 1970s when Beijing scientists realized that China could not sustain its growth on the energy consumption path it was on. Its natural resources would soon be depleted and the economy would not be able to grow at the same rates. In accordance with United State Energy Information Administration (2008), the International Energy Statistics shows that coal made up 71% of the energy consumed and oil made up 19%.These kind of energy produce high levels of greenhouse gas emissions. Therefore, it makes a serious problem – air pollution.

Air pollution is not a recent phenomenon. When we think about Beijing or Shanghai, a foggy and hazy air picture would appear on our mind. In a forum in Beijing on April 1, 2013, the 2010 Global Burden of Disease Study in conjunction with the Health Effects Institute presented the grim statistic that air pollution in China is linked to 1.2 million premature deaths (Wong, 2013). As we see, it is a very serious problem. China start to realize air pollution affects human and economy seriously, central establish more environmental