Thanks to Killy the frog, here is a reliable digest of the Chinese economy/ecology (and social!) situation.
First, a really good, but looong, article from The New York Times, including beautiful horror pictures of China nowadays, a video analyzing the national “Green G.D.P.”, and some slides with statistics & numbers. Then, some additional figures concerning China & Global footprint, from Guardian website.
Good luck Earth!
No country in history has emerged as a major industrial power without creating a legacy of environmental damage that can take decades and big dollops of public wealth to undo.
But just as the speed and scale of China’s rise as an economic power have no clear parallel in history, so its pollution problem has shattered all precedents. Environmental degradation is now so severe, with such stark domestic and international repercussions, that pollution poses not only a major long-term burden on the Chinese public but also an acute political challenge to the ruling Communist Party. And it is not clear that China can rein in its own economic juggernaut.
What is China’s real gross domestic product when the cost of pollution is subtracted? Recently the Chinese government tried to calculate a national “Green G.D.P.” and the new formula showed the soaring economy in a more sober light.
Public health is reeling. Pollution has made cancer China’s leading cause of death, the Ministry of Health says. Ambient air pollution alone is blamed for hundreds of thousands of deaths each year. Nearly 500 million people lack access to safe drinking water.
Here is an interactive map showing where pollution has most affected China’s landscape and how the country’s environment and economy compare with the rest of the world.
And last but not least:
这里有一个听觉的翻译：
Sources:
China’s Environmental Crisis
Global footprints: China and the rest of the world