How do China and Brazil deal with water pollution challenges? A comparative perspective of two emerging countries’ approach to water pollution problems docx

0 How do China and Brazil deal with water pollution challenges? A comparative perspective of two emerging countries’ approach to water pollution problems MSc China in Comparative Perspective London School of Economics 2009 - 2010 Candidate Number: 24247 Word Count: 9,866 1 Abstract With 70 percent of the earth's surface covered by water and the human body consisting of 60 percent of it, it is undoubtedly evident that water is one of the most important elements responsible for life on earth. China’s and Brazil’s rapid economic growth, industrialisation, dense population and massive urbanisation, in addition to the ineffective implementation of water management and pollution controls, have resulted in widespread water pollution. This dissertation provides a comparative analysis of how China and Brazil deal with water pollution challenges. This dissertation first explores the role of industrialisation in polluting freshwater in China and Brazil and predicts its future growing control following the predictions of the environmental Kuznets curve. Second, looking at the massive internal migration in China and Brazil this paper suggests that cities in China and Brazil are not capable to sustain the population size and accommodate the population growth, which is threatening the water security in urban areas. Third, the same causes that have boosted agricultural and rural development will be assessed in relation to their impact on environmental degradation and the possibility to implement the precautionary principle to avoid the emergence of new environmental accidents. Finally, fragmented coordination and bureaucratic competition within Brazil’s and China’s institutional organisation will be evaluated as a major reason for the lack of environmental pollution supervision. Informal rules such as the Chinese guanxi and the Brazilian clientelism will serve to explain the factors affecting policy implementation and compliance. China and Brazil have a very promising economic future; however, both must address their environmental problems in order to achieve their full potential. Time is necessary to implement change, yet both countries need to work against time if they wish to continue to enjoy their miraculous growth. Clean water is a crucial element for economic growth, healthy life and development but, it is also running out, which threatens long- term expectations for sustainable development. 2 3 Table of Contents Page Abstract………………………………………………… … ………… … 1 Table of Contents…………………………………… …… ……………… …… 3 Chapter I: Introduction Background and Motivation 4 Methodology 7 Chapter II: Overview Water Pollution Situation in China and Brazil 10 Chapter III: Comparative Analysis Industrialisation 13 Urbanisation 17 Rural and Agricultural Development 19 Environmental Policy Enforcement 22 Chapter IV: Conclusion Conclusion……… …………………….……………… ………….….29 Bibliography………………………………………………………… ……….31 4 CHAPTER I: Introduction Background and Motivation Agua, eau, su, lehçe, shui, water. Pronunciation may vary across languages, though its significance for human beings remains equally important. Water represents up to 60 percent of the human body and cover over 70 percent of the Earth’s surface (U.S. Geological Survey, 2010). Ancient civilisations, from Egyptians to Chinese to Mesopotamians, had their beginnings along great rivers for agricultural, transportation, and safety reasons. China, a hydraulic civilisation, was mainly defined by the water of its rivers, floods, and rains, especially the Yellow River (Huang He), also known as the “dragon river” (Murray& Cook, 2002). The Amazon River is the backbone of Brazil and, it is the largest river in the world with a total flow larger than the next ten largest rivers. The numerous rivers that cross Brazil have provided tremendous natural resources and prosperity, which has been crucial in becoming Latin America’s largest and the world’s eighth largest economy. Rapid industrialisation and extreme focus on economic growth are, however, polluting waters in countries with enormous water resources like Brazil and China, despite that without clean, healthy waters, human development is not possible. China’s rapid economic growth is often considered the most fascinating economic miracle in contemporary world history. In fact, China has already become the second largest economy in the world and unprecedentedly lifted about 500 million people out of poverty over a generation (Malik, 2009). Such an extraordinary accomplishment has, nonetheless, caused tremendous pollution problems, especially on rivers, lakes, and streams. China’s rapid socioeconomic growth has brought new challenges to deal with, such as international competition, heavy industrialisation, environmental pollution, and pollution-related health problems. Furthermore, it has increased dramatically energy demand for resources and sacrificed the cleanness of natural resources like water. Elisabeth Economy argues, “the same dynamic that produced such success in the economic sphere, however, has also wreaked havoc on China’s natural environment” (Economy, 2004). China’s economic growth and industrialisation have been like a dual-edged sword to the world, as it already stands as one of the world’s largest CO2 emitters (Horii, 2001). The Chinese model of excessive focus on rapid economic growth will be unendurable without a real change in the country’s position against water pollution. According to the non-profit group Pacific Environment, it is estimated that around 320 million people in China lack access to clean drinking water, and around 70 percent of all water sources are polluted to some extent (Pacific Environment, 5 2009). In fact, this has drastically increased the cases of cancers, leading to the cancer villages phenomenon near water polluted sources. This is particularly serious in a country that contains some of the largest fresh water reserves in the world, and the largest population to be supplied. China’s model of rapid economic growth, however, will not be sustainable without a real change in its pollution prevention and control mechanisms. The top two most polluted cities in the world are actually located in China. Excessive industrialisation and reliance on polluting energy resources have severely damaged the Chinese environment. Pollution causes approximately 400,000 premature deaths a year and acid rain has increasingly become a serious concern which damage is estimated to total $5- 13 billion (Lew, 1999). Finding a way to ensure water pollution prevention and control is urgent to China in order to maintain its miraculous story. On the other side of the globe, Brazil has deserved to be called the Latin American miracle due to its astonishingly rapid socioeconomic growth as one of the world’s fastest growing economies. This has contributed to consolidate it among the emerging BRIC countries (Brazil, Russia, India, and China). Similar to China, Brazil contains large water resources from lakes and rivers, like the Amazons. Water resources management is undeniably a key element to achieve sustainable growth, as well as a more equitable and inclusive society. Nonetheless, rapid economic and industrial growth endangers Brazil’s urban water access. Cities like Sao Paulo are among the largest urban centres in the globe with over 20 million people. Major cities, however, suffer from polluted water due to residential and industrial sewage. Furthermore, it is believed that only 35 percent of collected wastewater received any treatment. Uncontrolled urban growth is becoming a growing threat to the environment. Both China and Brazil are often regarded by many developing countries as models to follow. As they achieve astonishing economic results, water pollution has become an extremely serious threat to their sustainable development. This research project will study and compare the approach of each country to freshwater pollution. I will also evaluate the effectiveness of their policy enforcement efforts to prevent and control water pollution. Although there is some literature on water pollution that analyses individually China and Brazil, there are nearly almost no studies that compare both countries together, despite their growing importance in the world. This dissertation will contribute to the existing literature by providing a comparison of how two emerging countries that belong to a similar category of development deal with one of the most serious contemporary problems. China and Brazil are often criticized when compared to the great achievements on water pollution treatment made by developed 6 countries, such some European nations. However, in order to best understand and evaluate their approach to water pollution issues they should be compared to countries with common socio- economic characteristics and a similar development stage. This will facilitate drawing clearer conclusions and identify more appropriate lessons that can be applied to China and Brazil. Preventing, reducing, and controlling water pollution is critical, thus, to maintain China’s and Brazil’s miraculous socioeconomic growth and provide an example to all those developing countries that follow their steps. My research question is, thus, not only important but vital due to the urgency of China and Brazil to address the problem of water pollution in order to ensure access to health and higher living standards to their respective populations. Much of the available literature focuses solely on either China or Brazil. This dissertation will, nonetheless, analyse and compare how both emerging countries deal with freshwater pollution issues. While previous comparative analysis has been usually done among developed economies or between emerging and industrialised countries, there are extremely few works that study pollution issues within emerging countries. Given the importance that emerging economies have for the world and in particular for their own regions, it is thus vital to further research issues like water pollution within an intercontinental comparative analysis framework. 7 Methodology How do China and Brazil deal with water pollution challenges? Emerging countries’ rapid socioeconomic growth is indeed a great example to follow for many developing countries around the world. Among them, both China and Brazil have proven in their respective regions that development is possible for all economies and have drawn a new path towards growth and prosperity. Nevertheless, water pollution is one of the most severe consequences of such phenomenon, as governments have advocated for an economic growth first, environmental protection later approach. In the past few decades, ruling institutions have attempted to tackle the water pollution problem due to the essential role that water plays in human lives. This dissertation will analyse and compare these two emerging countries’ approaches to freshwater pollution prevention and control. In order to analyse and compare the ways China and Brazil deal with water pollution challenges and assess their effectiveness, I will be looking at the impact on freshwater pollution of: industrialisation and economic growth, urbanisation, rural and agricultural development, and environmental policy enforcement. First, studying how water pollution has worsened in China by massive industrialisation, as factories often fail to meet environmental standards and discharge untreated wastewaters to local rivers, will provide an important assessment of the Chinese industrial impact on water pollution. The water consequences of Brazil’s export orientated industrialisation approach, that marked its economic policy, will be also analysed. Such comparison is crucial to understand how industrialisation in two different emerging countries has negatively impacted water pollution in diverse ways. Second, examining the phenomenon of massive urbanisation in China will demonstrate that excessive population density has an uncontrollable impact on water pollution, to the extent that des-urbanisation is currently encouraged. China’s socialist roots will be contrasted to the Brazilian system that has led to severe inequality and illegal settlements’ problems. Differences between both will be highlighted in order to assess how they have affected water pollution. Third, studying Brazilian agricultural fertilizers’ and agrochemicals’ discharge to rivers and streams will show the gravity of uncontrolled rural development. China’s rural industrial development drivers, Township and Village Industrial Enterprises (TVIEs) polluting practices will be analysed in order to deeper understand some of the main reasons for water contamination in China. Comparing both countries’ rural and agricultural sources of water pollution will help to demystify ideas of rural pureness that overlook the countryside’s role in contaminating water. Finally, policy enforcement problems of both China and Brazil will be studied in order to compare how informal rules affect water pollution control policies’ compliance in these two emerging countries, given their different socio-cultural background. 8 The research methodology for this dissertation is primarily based on a review of books and journal articles that examine environmental, economic, social and political topics related to Chinese and Brazilian environmental and, more specifically, water degradation; economic growth and industrial pollution in emerging countries; the impact of urbanisation and social inequality impact on water pollution in China and Brazil; the institutional framework that regulates water pollution control in both countries; and Chinese and Brazilian informal rules that stop policy compliance. For the purpose of this dissertation, only pollution on freshwater in both China and Brazil will be studied. Academic research books may provide useful theoretical and analytical frameworks, though some information and data may be outdated due to the rapid changing environmental and political issues in emerging economies like China and Brazil. Scholarly journal articles offer more in-depth interpretation and take innovative intellectual approaches to the issue. All these materials were accessed through the London School of Economics’ library, online journal databases, as well as other articles and reports available online. Data from books, journals, articles, and reports are accordingly cited and quoted. All the material has been selected according to content and relevance to the topic, and analysed carefully to understand the main arguments of authors. Nevertheless, my research encountered some language limitations, since some data and journals were only written in either Portuguese or Chinese. Moreover, finding general information about Brazil was limited, as most data was only found per regions due to Brazil’s federal structure. This dissertation, thus, explores economic, political, social, and environmental aspects to compare how two rapidly emerging countries like China and Brazil deal with water pollution. In Chapter II, an overview of the importance of water for a country’s development will be followed by an introduction of China’s and Brazil’s water resources and pollution problems. Chapter III will use a comparative analysis to explore different areas related to water pollution in China and Brazil that will help us to deeper understand how these two emerging countries deal with the issue. First, the role of industrialisation in polluting freshwater of China and Brazil will be studied and compared. In order to assess how China and Brazil deal with the problem of water pollution, the pollution intensity of GDP and the environmental Kuznets curve will be applied. Second, an analysis of the impact of urbanisation on water pollution in the Chinese and Brazilian contexts will contribute to the understanding of how water pollution is caused and controlled. Third, rural development will be compared by evaluating polluting elements of agriculture in both countries such TVIEs, fertilisers, and agrochemicals. This will be analysed through the precautionary principle in order to assess the risk of rural policies to cause harm to the rural environment. Fourth, environmental policy and water pollution control enforcement in China and Brazil will be studied through the fragmented coordination and 9 bureaucratic competition approaches, as the role of governmental institutions will be considered in dealing with this problem. Informal rules of behaviour, such as guanxi and clientelism, will serve to the purpose of analysing how social factors affect policy compliance and water pollution treatment efforts. Chapter IV will conclude the dissertation with an evaluation of the main arguments raised throughout the dissertation by using a comparative analysis to provide a more complete study and offer alternatives and suggestions for each country to improve water pollution prevention and control. The applicability of some aspects, however, might be challenged by China’s and Brazil’s unique socio-economic conditions. [...]... known as Brazil, that land was like a gigantic Eden with clean natural resources and a balanced harmony between men and nature Since the discovery of the Americas, Brazilian rivers and forests have been severely damaged for the sake of large agricultural production and mining, especially due to Brazil s rich gold resources As South America’s largest gold producer, Brazil has released into the Amazon about... unregulated water and sewerage runoff (Osava, 2007) As Rio de Janeiro metropolitan area has grown to the west towards the Guandú basin, the main cause of water pollution is the untreated runoff of water used by the civilians, particularly in illegal settlements (Osava, 2007) In contrast to China s major cities stagnant population, as the result of economic incentives to remain and return to secondary... create more pollution for the cities downstream By doing this, the cities’ authorities pass the pollution problem to the cities downstream and avoid real policy compliance Water has reached high rates of pollution mainly because of poor irrigation and industrial practices, lack of wastewater treatments, and direct wastewater dumping into the water flows A possible indicator to assess the rate of water. .. growing human populations Brazil s agricultural activity has been cited as a major pollutant to its main water flows (Sharp, 1979) The main agricultural-caused problem affecting Brazil s water quality is the presence of nitrate in underground water, and nitrate and phosphate in surface waters (Mello & Van, 2006) Water pollution caused by application of fertilizers and agrochemicals comes mainly from... water contamination The rapid growth of urban population has exceeded the ability of governments to expand sewage and water treatment infrastructure Approximately 30 million people are suffering from the water contamination in Brazil' s two largest metropolitan areas, Sao Paulo and Rio de Janeiro (Osava, 2007) Unlike China where the communist regime left the attachment to the land as its heritage, Brazilian... socially acceptable Simultaneously to population growth, the adverse effects of pollution are threatening to constrain the gains in production and put at risk sustainable agriculture development (FAO, 1995) Achieving sustainable agriculture and rural development (SARD) in China and Brazil is not an easy task, as the per capita water availability is falling rapidly Achieving SARD depends on both countries’. .. powerproduction and urban consumption purposes; whereas the other group is formed by rural inhabitants that want water for irrigation and farming (Bernardo, 2008) If Brazilians are to enjoy clean water, more needs to be done to ensure clean water accessibility and water pollution control 12 CHAPTER III: Comparative Analysis Industrialisation China s fast paced development has led it to become “the third... rural economies and prevent migration to the main urban centres (Ward & Liang, 1995) Rapid industrialisation has had a profound impact on China s environmental degradation and water pollution Environmental quality has declined sharply since 1978 (Swanson, 2001) In Zhejiang province alone, more than 65 percent of the total precipitation is now acidic and the total annual industrial wastewater discharge... China According to the 1997 World Bank Clear Skies Blue Water report, the annual cost of environmental pollution and degradation in China was equivalent to 8-12 percent of the Chinese GDP (Economy, 2006) Water availability is crucial for economic growth and human wellbeing; however, mismanaged economic activities have a profound negative impact on water availability and quality When water is scarce... contributor to global pollution (Murray & Cook, 2002) The main contributors to water pollution originate from industrial activities, chemical, organic, and thermal wastes; urban centres, sewage consisting of human wastes, and detergents; and rural activities, pesticides, fertilizers, and animal wastes (Brower et al, 1990) However, the most fundamental factors causing water pollution are the same that have . How do China and Brazil deal with water pollution challenges? A comparative perspective of two emerging countries’ approach to water pollution problems. political, social, and environmental aspects to compare how two rapidly emerging countries like China and Brazil deal with water pollution. In Chapter II, an