BEIJING - Soil samples across China have revealed remnants of heavy metals
dating back at least a century and traces of a pesticide banned in the 1980s, an
environmental official said on Wednesday, revealing the extent of the country's
pollution problems.
Street-level anger over air pollution that blanketed many northern cities this winter spilled over into online appeals for Beijing to clean water supplies as well.
The rotting corpses of thousands of pigs found last month in a river that supplies tap water to Shanghai drew even more attention to water safety.
Mr Zhuang Guotai, head of the ecological department of the Ministry of Environmental Protection, said a nationwide soil survey showed the countryside had paid a heavy price for an agricultural revolution that has seen grain production almost double in the last 30 years, despite a much reduced workforce.
"There is a cost behind the nine consecutive years of bumper grain harvests," he said at a conference in Beijing. "They rely on the heavy use of fertiliser, but the country needs to boost grain production so it is quite a difficult issue."
Mr Zhuang noted that as much as 65 per cent of the fertiliser in China's countryside was improperly used and left to pollute rivers and fields.
"All pollutants ultimately end up in the soil, and when we did the soil survey, we saw that even metal pollution from a hundred years ago was present, as well as the '666' pesticide banned in the 1980s."
Mr Zhuang said China aimed to release the results of the survey very soon, two months after access to the data was denied on the grounds that it was a "state secret".
He said the government always intended to disclose the survey results, which took four years to compile."
How safe is SAFE?
Lessons for me are:
1. scientific proof supposedly said that the fertilizers are SAFE to use right? I am sure they are. Just that there is an inconvenient truth that they MUST be used PROPERLY!! I would have thought the sales force and the 'train the farmers how to use the fertilizers safely' user training would have taken care of this!;
2. assuming the merchants or businesses that sold the fertilizers DID do their job properly. The farmers were educated. BUT, just maybe, they are overly enthusiastic to have their crops grow faster and bigger and it can be achieved by using MORE fertilizers!! This is definitely possible if education means: I tell or show you how to apply the fertilizers and the rest is up to you. I know but I don't know the proper way to use the stuffs or I know but I want the stuffs to help my crops grow faster and bigger!;
3. this type of reporting will capture some eyeballs for sure. The question is: how long will it stick? Many more reports will be on the economic growth, or the slowing down or lack of it, instead of on this 'long term ecological' challenges. Of course like some smart Chinese said: now that even the air that everyone breath is polluted, the very powerful and rich, especially the national leaders, WILL have to do something as it will be hard for them NOT to breath the 'natural but polluted air' when they come out to 'check on' their citizens and subjects! Maybe...
May the Chinese seriously tackle their environmental challenges so that those 'Chinese century' vision expounded by many so-called established smarties like Mr Lee Kuan Yew, Henry Kissinger, etc were trumpeting comes true!
Street-level anger over air pollution that blanketed many northern cities this winter spilled over into online appeals for Beijing to clean water supplies as well.
The rotting corpses of thousands of pigs found last month in a river that supplies tap water to Shanghai drew even more attention to water safety.
Mr Zhuang Guotai, head of the ecological department of the Ministry of Environmental Protection, said a nationwide soil survey showed the countryside had paid a heavy price for an agricultural revolution that has seen grain production almost double in the last 30 years, despite a much reduced workforce.
"There is a cost behind the nine consecutive years of bumper grain harvests," he said at a conference in Beijing. "They rely on the heavy use of fertiliser, but the country needs to boost grain production so it is quite a difficult issue."
Mr Zhuang noted that as much as 65 per cent of the fertiliser in China's countryside was improperly used and left to pollute rivers and fields.
"All pollutants ultimately end up in the soil, and when we did the soil survey, we saw that even metal pollution from a hundred years ago was present, as well as the '666' pesticide banned in the 1980s."
Mr Zhuang said China aimed to release the results of the survey very soon, two months after access to the data was denied on the grounds that it was a "state secret".
He said the government always intended to disclose the survey results, which took four years to compile."
How safe is SAFE?
Lessons for me are:
1. scientific proof supposedly said that the fertilizers are SAFE to use right? I am sure they are. Just that there is an inconvenient truth that they MUST be used PROPERLY!! I would have thought the sales force and the 'train the farmers how to use the fertilizers safely' user training would have taken care of this!;
2. assuming the merchants or businesses that sold the fertilizers DID do their job properly. The farmers were educated. BUT, just maybe, they are overly enthusiastic to have their crops grow faster and bigger and it can be achieved by using MORE fertilizers!! This is definitely possible if education means: I tell or show you how to apply the fertilizers and the rest is up to you. I know but I don't know the proper way to use the stuffs or I know but I want the stuffs to help my crops grow faster and bigger!;
3. this type of reporting will capture some eyeballs for sure. The question is: how long will it stick? Many more reports will be on the economic growth, or the slowing down or lack of it, instead of on this 'long term ecological' challenges. Of course like some smart Chinese said: now that even the air that everyone breath is polluted, the very powerful and rich, especially the national leaders, WILL have to do something as it will be hard for them NOT to breath the 'natural but polluted air' when they come out to 'check on' their citizens and subjects! Maybe...
May the Chinese seriously tackle their environmental challenges so that those 'Chinese century' vision expounded by many so-called established smarties like Mr Lee Kuan Yew, Henry Kissinger, etc were trumpeting comes true!
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