Chinese Logic
Already, one-third of China’s land mass is desert and it is losing 1500 square acres more a year to overgrazing, deforestation, urban sprawl and draught. Looking out the window of my plane from Beijing to Kunming, for the first half-hour I thought I was seeing snow. But then I realized the white was primarily in the valleys…and in what used to be terraced rice paddys. Didn’t make sense. I didn’t see a stick of wood or anything green. My god, I suddenly thought…this has all become desert! Don’t know how the few villages that could be seen below manage to grow anything to eat! Gave me the chills…like the ones you get when watching futuristic science fiction movies. As we approached Kunming for landing you could see thousands of acres of covered hothouses growing vegetables. So this is how much of China eats.
In Beijing the air seemed to be much improved this year from what I saw two years ago. But one night I woke up about 3am and looked out the window and you couldn’t see the buildings in the next block so I don’t know if China is manipulating the pollution.
Yet, President Hu goes on television to say that it is unfair for the developed countries to expect the developing “victim” countries to reduce their emissions at the same rate. China has four times more people, he says, and the developed countries have been contributing to the world’s pollution far far longer.
Don’t get the logic. My mother used to say “don’t cut off your nose to spite your face.”
Tags: Beijing, China, environment, pollution, Yunnan
Zoe
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