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SZ wrestles with eco-threat
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Song Yingwen
A COMMUNIQUE on environmental conditions in SZ in 2000 was released to the public yesterday.
Essentially a long list of figures, the report lists the considerable achievements Shenzhen made in environmental protection in the past year, but at the same time, an equally long list of figures illustrated the critical situation we are facing: acid rain became more frequent, up 11.9 per cent over the year before; discharges of waste gas, industrial dust and sulphur dioxide all increased; and the water pollution index showed that all the rivers in Shenzhen, except for the Xixiang River, were in a worse condition than they were in 1999.
“I wouldn't call it over-pessimistic if I admit that the current situation worries me a lot,” Zeng Chun, formal head of the Shenzhen Municipal Environmental Protection Bureau, said at a conference held on the subject on Monday. And his words got a ready response from the other experts present.
Severe shortages of water plus serious water pollution problems, poor air quality, noise pollution and over-exploitation of soil and lands are of particular concern among the experts.
Other than a stepped-up pace in legislation construction and tighter control over pollution sources, they also urged for the industrialization of businesses related to environmental protection.
“Only by encouraging investment from enterprises, either from home or abroad, can we pull the government out of the dilemma,” said Wang Faxiang, director of the Population, Resources and Environment Subcommittee of the local consultative body, the Shenzhen Municipal Committee of the Chinese People's Consultative Conference (CPPCC).
Financial allocation from government plus self-raised funds by enterprises have always been the source of funding for environmental protection projects in China, and Shenzhen is no exception. It is reported that even though the municipal government had agreed to spend over 20 billion yuan (US$2.4b) on environmental protection in the coming five years, there is still a large shortfall in the funding.
“Poor funding has become the bottleneck in improving environmental protection in the city. Opening this field to market forces to absorb funds from various channels is the only way out,” Lao Derong, chairwoman of the Shenzhen Energy Group's board of directors, stated.
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