The Chinese government will improve policy and legal systems to
ensure the public take part and play an important role in
environmental protection.
Addressing the Scientific Development Conference in Beijing, Pan
Yue, deputy director of the State
Environmental Protection Administration, said the country's
environment was getting worse.
"The pollution and ecosystem damage are more and more serious.
Treatment never catches up with the destruction, and public
discontent grows greater," Pan said.
Growing population, shrinking resources, inadequate
environmental capacity and out-of-date production and consumption
models are to blame.
"But from a deeper perspective, lack of public participation is
another serious problem," he said.
Different from Western countries, China started its
environmental protection movement not from the ordinary citizens,
but at the top.
The government has implemented a large number of laws and
regulations on environmental protection since the 1970s when state
leaders realized the lessons of developed countries.
A regulation in 1978 stipulated that places where pollution was
serious, and where attitudes were resistant to change, would lead
to the sacking or even legal punishment of local government
officials.
"But how many officials have been punished for pollution? And
how many wrong local policies were corrected? Not many," said
Pan.
A series of practical, enforceable regulations and laws should
be issued to encourage and protect participation of people from all
walks of life in environmental protection. And democratic
supervision of the implementation of the laws should be
strengthened, he said.
To this end, the government should first make environmental
information available to the public.
The government has been publicizing information of daily air
condition, monthly river water quality and annual environment
conditions, but it was still a problem for an individual to inquire
relevant data from the government or an enterprise.
"We should begin to draft some regulations to ensure the
transparency of environmental information," said Pan.
He also pointed out the absence of regulations detailing the
public's participation in environment-related decision making,
though a law put into effect last year has made it clear major
projects that might affect the public environment should not be
started until public hearings are held.
Friday's conference, the first of a series of events to
celebrate the June 5 World Environment Day in Beijing, featured a
number of domestic and world environmental gurus, including Denis
Hayes, co-founder of Earth Day and Lester Brown, author of "Who
Will Feed China?"
There were also Maurice Strong, under secretary general and
special adviser to the Secretary General of the UN and Qu Geping,
former director of the Chinese environmental authority.
(China Daily May 29, 2004)