Pollution might hamper Chinese development

link

The serious state of environmental pollution elsewhere in China has been recognized by the Chinese government. In September, the State Environmental Protection Administration announced that China is losing the equivalent of 511.8 billion yuan (7.5 trillion yen) because of pollution of various kinds. The loss is equivalent to more than 3 percent of the country's gross domestic product, in a nation that boasts of annual economic growth rates of about 10 percent.

The fact that water pollution accounts for more than half of the estimated economic loss prompts me to wonder whether China will continue during the coming 50 to 100 years to suffer the negative aftereffects of its modernization and industrialization, as Japan did in the case of Minamata disease caused by industrial water contaminated with mercury.YomiuriNov. 18, 2006

(the photo: viaReading China through pictures.写真で読む中国