Happy Mother's Day!

In honor of the holiday, I want to talk a little about the best mother of all.. Mother Earth. (Sorry Mom, I love you!)


Here's an interesting article about China's ongoing battle with the environment. I've talked a lot of global warming with several of my classes and the results have varied between bemused condescension and genuine concern. Yet, none of them seemed to care very much that China is now the largest producer of carbon emissions. The most shocking thing to me was that many of my students couldn't think of any way that they could personally contribute to stopping global warming. Not one. Granted, these were my freshman who are, in general, the worst students on the planet, but I mean, come on.. Anyway, the article is really informative, but if you don't have the patience to read it (it's pretty long), I'll quickly summarize the most interesting points.

• 400,000 people in China die prematurely each year from respiratory illnesses.
  
• Four-fifths of the length of China's rivers are too polluted for fish.
• China now rivals North Africa as the world's leading producer of border-crossing dust (as my friend Min living in Korea has generously pointed out).
• China's GDP is growing at a rate of about 10% per year. But it is estimated that the result of China's environmental damage (everything from crops lost to health care costs) is costing 10% of its GDP. In essence, all of the economy's celebrated growth.

Another important thing to note is the consequences of our own choices as consumers (yes, I'm talking to you all the way across the world!) The article rightly points out the fact that our demand for cheap goods is fueling this environmental destruction that, whether we like it or not, will come back to get us one day. The wood furniture we conveniently purchase at Ikea is manufactured in China with illegally logged wood from Siberia and Indonesia. Deforestation accounts for 18% of the world's greenhouse gases. That's only one example, but I could go on. The fact is that, even though we have strict(ish) laws in the U.S. about pollution and emissions, the material goods that we desire have to be made somewhere. Unfortunately for the Chinese people, their government officials are not beyond the draw of all the dollars they get in manufacturing these goods. Indeed, the author elegantly states that China is merely following the American economic model. And as I've heard my students say, developed countries have polluted the earth for hundreds of years in order to become powerful, now it's our turn.

But the Chinese people are not taking this lying down. The article highlights that pollution and environmental damages caused an estimated 50,000 disputes and protests in 2005 alone. However, these protests have all met with the same response: government crackdown resulting in lives lost, in one case even, a 13-year old girl. As one demonstrator in Zhejiang province said, "They are making poisonous chemicals for foreigners that the foreigners don't dare produce in their own countries. It is better to die now, forcing them out, than to die of a slow suicide."