Garbage besieges one third of Chinese cities
- By Chen Boyuan
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E-mail China.org.cn, July 19, 2013
Excessive garbage is becoming a problem for China's urban and rural areas alike.
The latest survey by the Ministry of Housing and Urban-Rural Development (MOHURD) showed that more than one-third of Chinese cities were encircled by garbage. Junkyards take up 750,000 mu (50,000 hectares) of land nationwide, according to the survey.
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Excessive garbage is becoming a problem for China's urban and rural areas alike. [File photo] |
Beijing produces 18,400 tons of waste every day. Trucks would have to line the entire 50 km Third Ring Road if that garbage were to be shipped out all at once. If the 20,000 tons of garbage produced in Shanghai each day were allowed to collect, the mound of garbage would dwarf the 420-meter Jinmao Tower in just 16 days.
Rural areas are similarly waste-plagued. Some 40 Chinese townships, including 600,000 administrative villages, lack basic environmental protection facilities, according to Zhou Shengxian, China's environmental protection minister.
Zhou said much of the 280 million tons of garbage produced each year in rural areas is decomposed by natural means, rather than manmade ones.. "Besides wind blowing away waste and sun vaporizing polluted water, there is no other way," Zhou said.
There is mounting evidence that such an accumulation of garbage may be harmful to residents' health. Southern Metropolis Daily reported that 12 villagers died of cancer during the past decade in Guangdong Province. The 400-person village, located within Dongguan City's Humen Township, was labeled "cancer village" by the national media, including China Central Television, for the huge garbage pile located behind the town. At the time, medical experts said that the high mortality rate was "uncommonly seen."
Despite the health risks, though, China's garbage-handling capabilities have continued to lag behind its other developments. Beijing, for example, is only able to process 10,300 tons of garbage per day. The remaining 8,000 tons are left untreated.
A 2011 survey of 657 Chinese cities by Environmental Protection Industry's China Association found that 91.1 percent of all garbage was treated, with 20.1 percent landing in simple scrap yards or landfills. The survey found that 50 million tons of garbage were left unprocessed.
Land-filling, incineration and recycling are the three major ways to treat garbage. Currently, most cities in China use landfills as their primary method of trash disposal. But given the country's large population and scarce land resources per capita, landfills are only a temporary and unsustainable solution.
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