Chinese walker

The first sandstorm of autumn 2006 blew up in Alashan`s Left Banner, an administrative division of Inner Mongolia, on August 27. Alashan (or Alxa), in the far west of this autonomous Mongol region of China, has been the focus of considerable attention in recent years for just that reason: it is one of the sources of Asia`s sandstorms.

Official data show that Alashan`s desert area expanded from 92.71% of its total land in 1996 to 93.14% in 2004, an increase of 0.43 percentage points — and every tenth of a point represents another 200 square kilometres of infertile land. Alashan`s three deserts — the Badain Jaran, the Tengger and the Ulan Buh – are gradually merging, already meeting in three places in Left Banner and four in the Right Banner locality.

“Increasing numbers of both people and livestock, and over-development of agriculture, are at the root of Alashan`s environmental degradation,” says Tsang Buch, chief of the Alashan League Forestry and Desert-Control Bureau.

Historical data put Alashan`s population during the early years of the People`s Republic (founded in 1949) at a little less than 35,000. Now, it is 212,000 – a six-fold leap (in contrast to a 2.4-fold population increase nationally over the same period).

Due in large part to pre-1949 conscription by warlords in Ningxia and the famines of the 1950s and `60s, an influx of outsiders — of different ethnicity — moved into Alashan. They had an unprecedented impact on Alashan`s grassland culture, and the population growth led to an increase in the number of livestock.

Currently, the ideal livestock population for the league`s grasslands would be the equivalent of 700,000 sheep, but figures from July 2006 show that the actual figure is equivalent to two million sheep. And yet the herdspeople believe even that figure is an underestimate. In the 1990s, the village of Helan in Left Banner raised 30,000 sheep, but government statistics showed only a third of that number.

To relieve pressure on the grasslands and allow the environment to recover, Alashan launched a succession of large-scale relocations of its inhabitants to the newly founded towns of Xitan and Manshuitan in Left Banner in 1989. The keeping of livestock was banned in the areas from which the people were moved.

In January 1995, the league`s then-party secretary, Fu Laiwang, put forward a “relocation strategy” consisting of moving herders from their pastures to oases and towns to work in the private sector. Official reports show that, to the end of 2005, the league had relocated 19,082 people, and plans for 2006-10 will see a further 21,754 moved. That means that by 2010, 40,836 people — 20% of the 2005 population of 212,000 and 80% of the herding population – will have been relocated.

But solving the environmental issues has given rise to new social problems. The relocations have left large numbers of former herders in poverty.

In 1999, the Left Banner government decided to reforest pastures in the Helan Mountain Nature Reserve and relocate the local population. Some 6,000 locals were moved, 230,000 head of livestock disposed of and 230 acres of land converted.

Each relocated person received an RMB 500 resettlement allowance, with compensation of RMB 1,000 for each sheep pen demolished, RMB 140 per square metre for brick houses and RMB 100 per square meter for mud houses. (The RMB is now valued at roughly 7.8 to the US dollar.) Those in the first two rounds of relocation received RMB 4.95 per mu (one-fifteenth of a hectare) of land per year, for five years. In the third round, in 2001, that RMB 4.95 was replaced with 5.5 kilograms of past-its-best grain. After relocation, the herders – now farmers – made most of their income from planting crops, but (including compensation) only earned one third of their original incomes.

When I visited Sumurtuu Gacha, former herder Tumurbaatar was tending to the chickens in his yard. He said that, on leaving the grasslands in 2005, his family had sold 400 head of sheep and has relied since then on government subsidies to survive. His family of seven will receive over RMB 100,000 in compensation annually, for a five-year period.

Tumurbaatar worries about the future. “What happens in five years? We`re not allowed to herd, and we`ve no land to farm. The government hasn`t arranged any work for us. All we can do is raise a few chickens and ducks. The village is full of people like us.”

Yang Mudan, deputy professor of economics at Alashan`s communist party school, stressed the problem of herders returning, or even becoming vagrants. A 2004 Environmental Quality Evaluation in Alashan found 34,000 herders living below the poverty line, with 4,700 in absolute poverty. Many areas were no longer able to support either man or livestock, and 20,000 herders had moved away, become environmental refugees.

The deputy governor of Alashan, Gong Jiadong, admits that “ensuring work for the herders is essential for successful relocation. Simply handing out compensation doesn`t work.”

Alashan`s administrative office decided to focus on encouraging private businesses to absorb those who are relocated. In early 2006, the “relocation strategy” was adjusted, with the focus shifting from oases to towns and cities. At the same time, Alashan`s drive towards urbanisation and industrialisation become more apparent.

“Economic growth in Alashan is quite fast, 30% a year on average,” according to the head of Alashan`s Environmental Testing Station, Taao Gerrela. “Most of that growth comes from industry.” A further 21,754 people are to be moved for environmental reasons between 2006 and 2010, but Yang Mudan believes it is still not certain that Alashan`s economy can absorb them.

Meanwhile, rapid industrialisation is causing more pollution and damaging the environment. Severe pollution has lead to Alashan`s industrial centers – the towns of Lantai and Wusitai in Left Banner – being placed under strict supervision by the State Environmental Protection Administration and the Ministry of Land and Resources. The 600-kilometre journey from Bayan to Ejina Banner runs almost entirely through desolate gravel and sand desert.

How should the successes and failures of environmental policy in Alashan be explained?

Grasslands expert Liu Shurun is firmly opposed to enclosures and relocations, believing that it is not beneficial to the grass, to the people or the livestock – it is simply moving from one extreme to another. “Livestock, in appropriate numbers, are good for the grasslands – you can`t have grasslands without them,” he says.

Sheep eat 700 types of grass, and livestock eating and walking on the grass both stimulates growth and controls it. It is not harmful, and without animal activity, the grass grows out of control. Also, after enclosure, grasslands are no longer fertilised by livestock excrement and over time only one or two species of grass will survive, homogenising that population.

Liu points out that inappropriate environmental policies are a result of a farming nation`s failure to appreciate herding culture — an unthinking application of Han Chinese experience. The enforced practice in Alashan can only be ascribed to government ignorance and an unchecked spread of the popular view of development. Liu goes as far as to say that herding has been the natural choice in Alashan for thousands of years, and that grassland society should be restructured around a nomadic system.

“For years now,” said the Alashan SEE Ecology Association`s deputy secretary, Deng Yi, “the government has been doing its utmost to protect the environment, but you can see that when separating people and the environment in order to allow the environment to recover is very effective. When livestock is kept out by fences, the pressure on nature is lessened. In fact, that fence is dead and people are alive, camels are big and sheep are small – that is to say, you can`t change people, and if the herders` behaviour doesn`t change, any measures will only be for show.”

Song Jun, deputy head of the ecology association, believes that the scarcity of government successes in environmental protection is due to the top-down nature of implementation. The government designs the rules of the game and implements the projects – but it is not an interested party, a stakeholder.

Song believes that environmental protection should be commercialised, with interested parties identified, the government putting preferential policies in place, and environmental protection then implemented by the market. The herders should also participate, becoming beneficiaries of the ecology industry.

Zhou Jigang, formerly of Economy magazine and Hong Kong`s Phoenix Weekly, focuses on in-depth reporting about macroeconomics and current affairs. His investigations into radioactive pollution in Baotou and China`s underground industries both caused considerable controversy in China.

Years before China completed its first certified green building, a team from Beijing went to meet with engineers in the US to discuss environmentally-friendly design. But when the Chinese team showed some early sketches to their American colleagues, the response was not what they were expecting.

The American engineers said the plans were completely unworkable – the lighting design, water systems, ventilation and so on would all to be redone. This setback left Gao Lin, the lead Chinese architect on the project, “looking completely shell shocked,” recalls Robert Watson, a senior scientist with the New York-based Natural Resources Defense Council, who advises the Chinese government on green construction. “He blinked and looked at me and said, %26lsquo;It`s like I`m seeing architecture for the first time.`”

Though it may lack the flair of much of Beijing`s newer designs, the resulting building, completed in 2004, is a wonder of environmental design and the first structure in China to receive a gold rating under the US Green Building Council`s coveted Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design standard, or LEED (a certification established by Robert Watson). Sitting just south of Yuyuantan Park in western Beijing, the ten-storey ACCORD21 office building uses 70% less energy than similar structures and saves 10,000 tons of water a year through rainwater collection. All this translates into enough savings to build a similar building seven years down the road.

ACCORD21 office building

At an afternoon press conference during the International Olympic Committee`s visit last summer, Hein Verbruggen, the Dutch chairman of the committee, described the city`s Olympic preparations as “stunning.” Another official said he had never, in two decades, seen such an organized plan for the Games. Even as a thick haze covered the city, Jiang Xiaoyu, the vice president of the city`s Olympic committee, explained to journalists that pollution would be brought under control, reassurances that were backed by the sanguine visiting officials. Then someone asked about the traffic.

The glow on Mr. Jiang`s face seemed to fade. Mr. Verbruggen skipped a beat before making a carefully worded assessment. “I can imagine it should be a problem for the people who have to plan for the traffic system. It’s an uphill battle for them.” He explained: “The traffic is rather busy.”

For a city that often looks more like a giant car park than a bustling metropolis, “busy” was not only an understatement, but also lacked a certain accuracy – “idle” might have been a better word. Even as Beijing scrambles to pave new roads to sustain a growing automotive yen – 1,000 new cars hit the streets daily – congestion continues to grow. And for the millions of commuters who rely on a highly-burdened subway and bus system, just getting to work can mean a daily struggle against cars, crowds and carcinogens. When Beijing slipped 10 notches to number 14 in a recent quality of life ranking of Chinese cities, bad transportation beat pollution as the biggest complaint. In July, a report by the World Bank slammed Beijing and similar cities for a “piecemeal and ad-hoc” transit planning that was not only wrecking the city`s quality of life but also clogging its economy.

Even upper-level officials – their black sedans not immune to the slow chaos of Beijing`s streets – have abandoned typical understatement. Once the threat of SARS faded in 2004, Beijing mayor Wang Qishan shifted his sights to a much more difficult target: “The contradiction between real estate development and traffic regulations is the biggest problem now facing Beijing,” he said.

China`s economic growth has been accompanied by an unprecedented surge in urban construction. In the mid-1990s, the World Bank predicted that building area in China`s cities would double in a decade. Yet the reality exceeds even that figure. One survey found that urban building area actually doubled in a mere five years, from 7.7 billion square metres in 2000 to almost 15 billion square metres in 2004. This growth outstrips that of the urban population, and hence the average living area per person is also rapidly increasing.

If this continues, where will it leave us? The following possibilities are described in China`s 11th Five-Year Plan and development plans up to 2020.

- Continue adding an extra 2 billion square metres of urban building area annually. By 2020, an additional 30 billion square metres will have been constructed, giving a total of 45 billion square metres and a per-capita average of 54 square metres.

- Continue building 2 billion square metres of building area annually, with half of this being in new areas. By 2020, an additional 15 billion square metres of urban floor area will have been constructed, giving a total of 30 billion square metres and a per capita average of 36 square metres.

- Build an additional 0.7 to 1 billion square metres annually. By 2020 an additional 10 billion square metres will have been constructed, with a total of 25 billion square metres and a per capita average of 30 square metres.

The rapid growth in urban construction has greatly improved the conditions of the residential, office and public spaces in which urban residents live. It has also spurred growth in the steel, non-ferrous metals and construction materials sectors. However, we cannot help but worry about the problems this over-rapid expansion may bring.

Urban expansion has swallowed huge quantities of cultivated land. From 1998 to 2005, China`s cities expanded by 50%. Some eastern coastal cities already suffer from a land shortage, with no space for new building. Urban construction inevitably requires new roads, green areas and so on. If we assume a floor-area ratio of 0.7 to 1, then 10 billion square metres of new floor area will require 14 billion square metres of land. If 20 billion square metres are constructed on cultivated land, it will reduce China`s total cultivated land by 2.4%.

In 2005 China`s steel industry consumed power equivalent to 250 million tonnes of coal, 70% of which was for construction-related production. Production of concrete accounted for a further 100 million tonnes of coal, 50% of which was for construction. Another 100 million tonnes of coal was used in the production of non-ferrous metals and other construction materials. The equivalent of 300 million tonnes of coal was used powering the production of materials for urban construction, 15% of China`s total commercial power generation. In a sense, the higher-than-GDP growth in power consumption over the last three years is due to over-rapid urban and infrastructure construction.

Urban construction cannot continue at its present speed. If it is allowed to reach its limit and suddenly halted, then factories will close and equipment will lie idle, causing social problems. Alternatively, a slowing of construction will reduce the demand for building materials, greatly diminish the potential future problems and meet the needs of sustainable development. This will cause problems for GDP and employment today, but the key is to resolve these matters through the value-added service sector. We must not create long-term dangers for the sake of short-term growth.

Power consumed during regular use of a building accounts for 80% or more of its total lifetime consumption. In the operation of urban buildings, consumption consists of winter heating for those in northern areas, non-heat-related power use in residential and general public buildings, and consumption by large public buildings — accounting for 20 to 22% of total public power consumption. Such consumption by buildings is related to their size, and as they increase in number, so does their power use. If China`s urban buildings double in number, power consumption may well increase by an ever greater amount. In the United States, Japan and Europe, building-power consumption has risen from between 20 and 25% to almost 40% as these regions become focused on finance and technology.

As China`s stock of urban buildings has doubled in five years, the percentage of new buildings is high and few of them are in current need of repair. Therefore, maintenance costs do not make up a significant part of overall construction investment. However, as time passes these costs will gradually become more apparent. Statistics show that in the United Kingdom in 1980, repair costs accounted for two-thirds of total civil-engineering spending. The average for developed countries is about 50%.

Over the last two decades, China`s building-quality control has been weak and building lifespans have been short. Now, the huge number of new buildings will begin to need costly repairs at approximately the same time. This may even impact upon sustainable social and economic development.

The development of American society was founded on the consumption of global resources, and its high level of living space per person demonstrates the country`s profligate use of materials and energy. Western Europe`s post-war construction took place in the 1950s, when the US already controlled much of the world`s resources; building area per capita stabilised at about 60% of the US figure. Development in Asia took place in the late 1950s and 1960s, when the first hints of resource shortages were appearing — and so these countries tended to conserve resources. However, a relative lack of living space did not prevent economic growth or improved living standards.

In comparison with more developed parts of Asia, China`s building area per capita is by no means low. Even if 15 million rural residents move to the cities each year, only 500 million to 600 million square metres of new construction will be required to avoid falling behind the Asian average. If that figure rises to 1 billion square metres, then by 2025 we will reach western European levels. At 2 billion square metres, we would surpass America`s current standard by 2030. But will our reserves of land, resources and power, and our environmental circumstances, allow us to pursue these standards? More living space will incur huge power, environmental and maintenance costs – without guaranteeing greater efficiency or living standards. This high-cost, low-return choice is not one that China should make.

A conserving society is our only option for modernisation, and controlling construction is an important characteristic of a conserving society.

One of the strategic goals of the 11th Five-Year Plan is to reduce the power consumed per RMB 10,000 of GDP by 20%. If urban construction can be reduced from its current 1 billion square metres per year to between 600 million and 800 million square metres, market demand for construction materials will fall by two-thirds and the power consumed in construction of those materials (including steel) will fall from 20% of the current total to 10%. That would bring us half-way to meeting that strategic goal.

Current urban construction is already adequate for social, economic and living needs. To continue blindly expanding construction for the sake of GDP growth and fail to restructure production will result in the wasting of resources and power – a dangerous choice completely at odds with our aims of sustainable growth. The construction of large, luxurious homes should be stopped, with the average size of a household limited to 90 square metres or less. New construction should be limited, falling from the current total of over 1 billion square meters annually to 600 million square metres within five years.

Rational control of urban construction is essential for the sustainable development of China`s cities.

Jiang Yi, professor at Tsinghua University and Academician of the Chinese Academy of Engineering, is an expert on building and environmental engineering. He is noted for his research on power-saving buildings and ecological construction.

Also about urbanisation on chinadialogue: Toward sustainable urbanisation in China

Homepage photo by Natalie Behring

“If the last century was the century of urbanisation, the twenty-first will be the century of cities. It is in the cities that decisive battles for the quality of life will be fought, and their outcomes will have a defining effect on the planet`s environment and on human relations.”

So writes Jaime Lerner, a former governor of southern Brazil`s Paran%26aacute; state and former mayor of Curitiba, Paran%26aacute;`s capital, in his forward to the Worldwatch Institute`s just-released annual report, State of the World 2007: Our Urban Future. An internationally recognised architect and urban planner, Lerner knows of what he speaks. During his years in office in rapidly developing Brazil, he implemented numerous social, ecological and urban reforms, including an integrated transportation system in Curitiba that has caught the attention of mayors and urban planners in the Americas, China and elsewhere.

The significance of this new, global urban supremacy — for both people and planet – is profound, and the statistics are stark: About 35% of the population of Africa and Asia is now urban — a figure that is expected to stand at 50% by 2030. From 1970 to 2000, just 4% of the $1.5 trillion in development assistance worldwide was for urban aid. And while cities cover a mere 0.4% of the earth`s surface, they generate the bulk of the planet`s carbon emissions.

Sometime in 2008, a threshold will be crossed: the point at which more people – roughly 3.2 billion human beings — will be living in the world`s urban areas than in its rural ones. Between now and 2030, the population of the earth is projected to grow by 1.1 billion, according to the Worldwatch report. If global development priorities are not reassessed to account for massive urban poverty, well over half of these newcomers may end up living in under-serviced slums: urban settlements in developing countries without such necessities as clean and convenient water and sanitation facilities, health care and durable housing.

“The combined impact of a growing population and an unprecedented wave of migration from the countryside means that over 50 million people – equivalent to the population of France – are now added to the world`s cities and suburbs each year,” says Worldwatch`s president, Christopher Flavin, in his preface to Our Urban Future.

“More than at any other time in history,” writes Flavin, “the future of humanity, our economy, and the planet that supports us will be determined in the world`s cities.”

As cities become more populated, more and more of the world`s energy-hungry buildings are taking form there. Worldwide, buildings account for more than 40% of total energy use. Much of that energy – particularly in urban areas — is heavily reliant on fossil fuels, the primary engine of global climate change. And, of course, as China booms economically, the country is increasingly a key factor in the planet`s urban future. Already home to 16 of the world`s most polluted cities, China sees millions of its people move to cities each year.

“In 2005,” the Worldwatch report says, “Shanghai constructed more building space than exists in all the office buildings of New York City. Every month, China adds urban infrastructure equal to that found in Houston, Texas, simply to keep up with the masses of people migrating from rural areas to cities.”

Unlike many people, who fear that an increasingly urbanised future will mean more problems than solutions for the planet, Flavin (like Lerner and others who contributed to the new Worldwatch report) views cities not as “hopeless and apocalyptic places” but as “exciting laboratories of change”. Such optimism, he insists, “is central to the future of cities – and the world itself.”

photo by Java Cafe

Like it or not, the global future will be urban. So, what can be done to improve that future, to fight poverty and environmental injustice in cities? The 250-page report addresses a wide range of practical topics, including urban farming, green transportation, energy efficiency, natural-disaster risks, public health and sanitation, and local economics. While acknowledging that “there is no magic bullet for creating sustainable, equitable and peaceful cities,” Our Urban Future points to five “necessary if not sufficient conditions for such transformations.”

Spelled out by Janice E. Perlman, a consultant on urban poverty and environmental justice issues, and Molly O`Meara Sheehan, State of the World 2007`s project director, they are:

– Transparent governance. This includes confronting corruption by fostering competition, which in turn would reduce bureaucratic leeway and increase accountability. The report cited La Paz, Bolivia, where bribery in construction permits was reduced by simplifying and advertising the rules, contracting-out the permitting to architects, and reducing the city`s role to oversight carried out by fewer (and better paid) municipal employees.

– Decent work or a basic income. For the urban poor, jobs – which afford dignity – are a key factor. Job creation, as well as skills-training work in growing market sectors, is needed. So, too, is access to financial tools such as savings and credit, including the many forms of microfinance. Large companies can play an important role, as in Mexico, where the cement company CEMEX developed a scheme by which low-income families can buy materials to build and improve their housing. Local governments can hire the urban poor to help address environmental problems, such as in a Rio de Janeiro community reforestation project to protect the city`s vulnerable shantytowns from flooding. Contracted local workers also have carried out rebuilding after flooding in Dar-es-Salaam, Tanzania, and Kampala, Uganda. “Conditional cash transfer programmes” – by which low-income families receive cash as an incentive for desirable actions, such as sending children to school or having them immunised against contagious diseases – also have a role to play.

– Innovations in conservation. Cities without full infrastructure, including much of China, can “leapfrog” over outmoded, wasteful systems dating back to the Industrial Revolution and start with twenty-first century technology. The built environment can be revolutionised by taking advantage of high- and low-tech resource-conservation strategies: installing water-conserving toilets, separating drinking and grey-water systems, using passive solar energy or biogas for heating. Some projects in China will use biogas from wastewater for cooking, passive solar energy for heating and cooling and compressed earth for building materials. Indeed, the eastern coastal city of Rizhao, in Shandong province – home to nearly 3 million people – is a model municipality. Local leaders see the city`s enhanced environment – thanks to the wide use of solar power — as a key to long-term improvements in its social, economic and cultural spheres.

– Intelligent land use and integrated community development. Old planning tools can be used for progressive change. For example, zoning, building and land-use regulations can be adapted “to foster mixed-use communities, with homes close to workplaces, commerce and recreation”. Development in areas with infrastructure in place can help to limit urban sprawl. Special-interest areas can be set up, protecting environmentally important areas and connecting nature corridors. In Brazil, S%26atilde;o Paulo has led the way in creating a more inclusive city. One key step was taxing developers to create a fund for such public-interest investments as public transportation, housing and environmental upgrading. Dakar, Senegal, first tested a “sites and services” approach, by which small plots of land are laid out with connection to basic services and made available — for small sums or loans — to new migrants. (Retrofitting a squatter community is far more expensive.)

– Social cohesion and cultural diversity. Cities can be strengthened by cultural diversity, which makes human economics (like natural ecosystems) more resilient. In urban areas — torn by violent crime that further isolates the poor — the sale of guns and drugs needs to be controlled, along with the corruption that allows such activities to continue. Among initiatives considered promising are: community policing in low-income neighbourhoods; arts, culture and sports programmes for at-risk young people, and weapons amnesties.

Perlman, who founded the Mega-Cities Project in 1987 to address issues of urban poverty, notes that poor urban neighbourhoods are afflicted by “the worst of two worlds” — the environmental health hazards of both underdevelopment and industrialisation. “Yet their residents tread lightly on the planet %26hellip; The gap between rich and poor in cities from Nairobi to New York means that those with the fewest resources suffer most from pollution generated by the wealthiest.”

Indeed, the report says, “[t]he logical sequence linking global sustainability to urban poverty is synthesised in what have become known as the Perlman Principles.” In short:

– There can be no global environmental sustainability without urban environmental sustainability.

– There can be no urban environmental solution without alleviating urban poverty.

– There can be no solutions to poverty or environmental degradation without building on bottom-up, community-based innovations.

– There can be no impact at the macro level without sharing what works among local leaders and scaling these programs up into public policy where circumstances permit.

– There can be no urban transformation without changing the old incentive system, the “rules of the game” and the players at the table.

– There can be no sustainable city in the twenty-first century without social justice and political participation as well as economic vitality and ecological regeneration.

Approaches that work should be shared globally and, given the magnitude and urgency of the challenges ahead, it is important to start now, the Worldwatch report maintains. “Imagine the ideal, but do what is possible today,” urges Brazil`s Jaime Lerner. Mobility, sustainability and identity need to be addressed, he writes. Transport systems need to be combined and integrated. Urban infrastructure needs to have multiple functions, to be utilised 24 hours a day, for maximum saving and minimal waste. Riverbanks, parks and historic districts need to be nurtured to maintain quality of life and self-esteem for everyone living in an urban environment.

“A city is a collective dream,” Lerner asserts. “To build this dream is vital. %26hellip; Cities are the refuge of solidarity. They can be the safeguards of the inhumane consequences of the globalisation process. They can defend us from extraterritoriality and the lack of identity.

“On the other hand, the fiercest wars are happening in cities, in their marginalised peripheries, in the clash between wealthy enclaves and deprived ghettoes. The heaviest environmental burdens are being generated there, too, due to our lack of empathy for present and future generations.

“And this is exactly why it is in our cities that we can make the most progress toward a more peaceful and balanced planet, so we can look at an urban world with optimism instead of fear.”

Maryann Bird is a London-based freelance journalist with a special interest in environmental and human-rights issues. A writer and editor, she was previously a staff member at Time magazine (Europe), The Independent, the International Herald Tribune and The New York Times.

Both urban disasters and environmental hot spots are already located disproportionately in low-lying coastal areas. Climate change will increase the risk of both. In particular, rising sea levels will increase the risk of floods, and stronger tropical storms may further increase the flood risk. Low-income groups living on flood plains are especially vulnerable.

Given the long lead times required for climate change mitigation, this will be insufficient to prevent these risks from increasing. Moreover, most other measures, such as encouraging urban development in more environmentally suitable locations, or adapting coastal settlements to reduce their vulnerability, also have long lead times. The scale and nature of the risks need to be better understood in order to motivate and target timely measures. Much of the relevant information is local. However, given the global nature of climate change, it is also important to assess the international dimensions of the coastal risks it is already beginning to pose.

Human settlement has long been drawn to coastal areas, which provide many resources and trading opportunities but also expose residents to various hazards. Historically, the attraction of coasts has been particularly strong among trading nations and empires. In Indonesia, for example, the Mataram Empire, which relied on tribute from rice farmers, favoured inland cities and monuments, while the Sri Vijaya Empire, which relied on controlling trade, favoured coastal cities. Colonialism and the expansion of international trade during the colonial period contributed to the coastal location of many contemporary cities.

The recent expansion of international trade has also contributed to population movements towards the coast. The pre-eminence of ocean shipping has declined, with air freight growing in relative importance. But at least in terms of tonne-kilometres shipped, however, ocean shipping still dominates. Shipping now accounts for less than half of the value of the United States` merchandise imports and exports but about three-quarters of the weight. In other countries the decline in shipping is far less evident – for Japan the corresponding figures rise to almost three-quarters of the value and over 99% of the weight. China`s on-going economic boom is one of the clearest examples of trade-related coastward movement the world has ever seen, although one could argue that government economic policies have been as important as market pressures in causing this movement.

Serious consequences

The concentration of populations and economic activities on and near the coast has had serious environmental consequences. Urban systems have radically altered the flows of water, energy and materials, transforming the pre-existing ecosystems. The review of coastal systems undertaken for the Millennium Ecosystem Assessment concluded that coastal ecosystems, both onshore and offshore, are among the most productive in the world, and also among the most threatened by human settlement. It is estimated that about one-third of coastal mangrove forests and one-fifth of coral reefs have already been lost. In many parts of the world, coastal fish populations have declined considerably.

When scientists recently reviewed conditions in 12 harbours of major Asian cities, all but one had exhibited drastic fishery declines (as well as numerous other environmental problems) in recent decades.

Many coastal populations are at risk from flooding – particularly when high tides combine with storm surges and/or high river flows. Between 1994 and 2004, about one-third of the 1,562 flood disasters, half of the 120,000 people killed, and 98% of the 2 million people affected by flood disasters were in Asia, where there are large population agglomerations in the flood plains of major rivers (e.g. Ganges-Brahmaputra, Mekong and Yangtze) and in cyclone-prone coastal regions (e.g. Bay of Bengal, South China Sea, Japan and the Philippines).

Some features of urban development increase the rise of flooding. Water drains more rapidly from built-over land, increasing peak flows and flood risks, particularly if the built drainage system is not adapted accordingly. In many parts of the world, developers have drained wetlands, sometimes reducing malaria prevalence or opening up valuable land for urban development, but also removing a buffer against tidal floods. Particularly in delta regions, land compaction, subsidence due to groundwater withdrawal and reductions in the rate of sediment deposition (due to water regulation) can lead, in effect, to sea-level rise, increasing flood risk (as well as creating various other problems).

While economic activity and urban development often increase the environmental pressures that lead to flooding, low-income settlements, and poor groups within all settlements, tend to be the most vulnerable. On the one hand, affluent settlements and groups are in a better position to take protective measures and to adapt or escape when flooding does occur (as media coverage and research on hurricane Katrina and New Orleans amply demonstrated). On the other hand, the poorest residents of the cities of low-income countries are often forced (implicitly or explicitly) to settle in flood plains or other hazard-prone locations, as they cannot afford more suitable alternatives.

Climate change will increase the risk of flooding, as well as causing other environmental damage in coastal areas. The estimates of global mean sea-level rise in the Special Report on Emissions Scenarios of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) range from 22 centimetres to 34 centimetres, between 1990 and the 2080s. Far faster sea level rise (more than a metre per century) could result from accelerated melting of the Greenland ice sheet or the collapse of the West Antarctic ice sheet, although this is not considered likely during the twenty-first century. It has been estimated that, in the absence of any other changes, a sea-level rise of 38 centimetres would increase five-fold the number of people flooded by storm surges.

The risks to human settlements could be reduced if people and enterprises were encouraged to move away from the coast, or at least from the most risk-prone coastal locations (this would also reduce the pressures human settlements place on coastal ecosystems). But current population movements are in the opposite direction. Given the character of urban development, and that the factors driving coastward movement are still poorly understood, turning these flows around is likely to be slow, costly or both. In particular, there is the danger that ill-considered or politically short-sighted measures to shift population from the coastal areas will impose unnecessary economic costs on key coastal enterprises and fail to provide the basis for viable alternatives inland or in more appropriate coastal locations. More appropriate measures are sorely needed, and the earlier the better.

In order to support efficient and equitable means for moving the most vulnerable urban settlements, a better understanding is needed of why (and in some cases whether) urban settlements in coastal areas are growing more rapidly than inland. Avoiding policies that favour coastal development (such as the special economic zones in China, whose rapid population growth is described below), and imposing more effective coastal zone management, could make a difference in the longer term. Relatively small shifts in settlement location, out of a coastal plain onto more elevated ground, can make a major difference. However, experience after the Indian Ocean tsunami of 2004, in which over 200,000 people lost their lives and millions more their homes, has demonstrated the profound difficulties involved in instituting more restrictive coastal settlement policies without further undermining the lives and livelihoods of the most vulnerable residents.

Coastal development can also be encouraged to adapt to the risks of climate change. To date, adaptation motivated by climate change has been minimal. However, measures to reduce exposure to existing weather-related hazards can also serve as means of adapting to climate change. Embedding adaptive measures within the urban infrastructure is again either very costly or very slow. It is likely to be easier if action is taken as new areas are settled, rather than after their infrastructure is in place. It has been suggested that development assistance projects could introduce measures to assist in adaptation to climate change. More generally, there are likely to be important areas of overlap between adaptation to climate change, other forms of disaster preparedness and measures to address local environmental health issues (e.g. improved water, sanitation, waste disposal and drainage systems). Particularly for the urban poor, an equitable resolution of the land issues that drive people to settle on land already susceptible to flooding could make a large difference.

Map: CIESIN

China and Bangladesh

In a dank alleyway in the old quarter of Beijing is a half-renovated house with a gaping hole where the roof should be. It has no garden or pool and had, until recently, only a few modern amenities.

But this traditional courtyard home has just been sold for 110 million yuan (about $14.2 million, or %26pound;7.1 million) — thought to be a record for a residential property in Beijing. It is the latest sign of rising incomes, changing tastes and growing inequality as the capital undergoes a pre-Olympic housing boom that puts even London in the shade.

Despite government measures to cool growth, the Beijing housing sector has never been hotter. According to the local media, average prices in the city increased by almost 10% in February. Estate agents claim that many luxury homes have doubled in value in three years.

Until a few years ago, most speculators focused on modern apartments in inner-city tower blocks and new villas in the suburbs. But the record-breaking home is an old-style siheyuan (courtyard) in the downtown houhai (“back sea”) area of the city.

Walled quadrangle residences were popular with the nobility and courtiers, but after the communist revolution of 1949, many were requisitioned and partitioned for families loyal to the new government. Often overcrowded and notorious for their smelly communal toilets and unsafe coal-fired boilers, many of these old neighbourhoods have been treated as slums by the authorities. In the race to modernise in time for next year`s Olympics, tens of thousands of homes have been demolished in the city`s old hutong alleyways.

In the central area, only 3,000 courtyards remain, giving them a rarity value that has pushed up prices. The one just sold was particularly valuable because it is a huge property, ideal for modernisation, and close to the city`s liveliest lakeside entertainment district.

Each of its 3,028 square metres sold for more than 36,000 yuan (over $4,600, or %26pound;2,300), more than double the price previously fetched by any home in the neighbourhood. The buyer remains anonymous, though local media have speculated that he is a coal-mine owner from Shaanxi province or a Russian billionaire.

The new owner will be in mixed company. While many Beijing siheyuan are still occupied by working-class families, others have been snapped up by wealthy foreigners, senior officials, contemporary artists and the new rich. Two years ago, media tycoon Rupert Murdoch reportedly was pressed into buying one for 30m yuan by his wife, Wendi Deng.

Such purchases can be risky in a city where planners often requisition land for development. Last October, Beijing`s first courtyard auction was cancelled after an hour because wary bidders failed to meet even the reserve price of $225,000 (%26pound;113,000). But the passage of the nation`s first property law this year and state protection orders for hundreds of courtyards appear to have strengthened the market.

“The reason courtyards were not that popular before is because people did not appreciate their value and potential for investment,” said Hu Chaohui, manager of a real-estate company. “But they are very special. They are rare and centrally located. In addition, their prices not only include the usage value but also the historical and cultural value.”

Critics say, however, that “conservation” often means knocking down an old building and replacing it with a structure in a traditional style. “The way now is to build fake old. It is not nice,” said Ma Yansong, an architect. “The hutongs attract many tourists. The poor, old residents are either like actors in a theme park or else they are kicked out so the rich can buy up the properties. The old community spirit is being lost.”

http://environment.guardian.co.uk/

The homes and livelihoods of a million slum dwellers are threatened by development plans in Mumbai. These include the current development plans for Dharavi, Asia`s largest slum, and for Mumbai`s international airport (around which close to half a million people live in informal settlements). But these slum dwellers do not oppose redevelopment. Everyone in Dharavi wants improvements. They have invested in improvements which they could afford and manage, and they have high expectations that the state should also make similar investments. Those who live closest to the airport runways recognise that they will have to move. But they want to be consulted and involved in the design and implementation of the redevelopment and resettlement plans. The airport settlements have around 100,000 households, and thousands of local businesses.

This is not asking much. Official plans for developing Dharavi and the international airport acknowledge that they must rehouse or resettle the slum dwellers. So the issue is how this rehousing is organised – and for those that have to be resettled, the location chosen. Slum-dweller organizations have shown how they can be good partners in the design and management of such redevelopments. The federation of slum-dwellers living along the railway tracks in Mumbai worked with the Railway Authorities and state government of Maharashtra to move 20,000 households to allow improvements in the railway. Without conflicts. The households who moved did not have to be forced off their land; they packed up their belongings and moved on the designated day. The key here was that they had been involved in all aspects of the redevelopment: in deciding who was entitled to be included; how the process would be designed; helping to choose the site to where they were moved; when they were moved and with whom they moved. Their own community organizations – especially women`s savings groups – helped manage the settlements to which they moved. Savings groups formed by pavement dwellers are also working in partnership with the government to move to allow road and traffic improvements. So the community leadership at the airport and Dharavi ask a question: how can the same government that worked so closely with the communities and NGOs to produce this highly effective partnership in relocating households to improve the railways not use the same strategy for the airport and for Dharavi?

The slum dwellers in Dharavi and on the airport lands are not being involved in the redevelopment plans. But they offer both the private companies and the government agencies involved in these plans a real partnership. The involvement is not just agreeing with what the government wants, but a real partnership to produce what works for communities and gives the government solutions that are sustainable and viable. The government and private companies may see the participation of communities as delaying the development, as adding costs. But our experiences to date show that it can reduce costs and speed up implementation. If this offer of partnership is ignored, it will often force slum communities to fall back to the usual and easier options of protest. The slum dwellers have some easy ways to make their opposition felt. Two of Mumbai`s main railway lines run along Dharavi`s borders. These can easily be blocked – and this would bring chaos to Mumbai, as such a high proportion of the workforce relies on these railways to get to and from work. The airport runways can also be blocked – and the slum dweller federations will inform all the airlines that operate there as to when and where this will happen. We do not want to resort to this; we want a partnership in making both these development plans and other plans in Mumbai a success.

The redevelopment of Dharavi

Over the last 20 years, statistics show, the winter temperature of Japanese homes has risen by between 5%26deg; to 10%26ordm; centigrade. This reflects the rising living standards that have accompanied economic growth in Japan, and shows how domestic energy consumption grows with the increasing comfort of the home. The same process has already taken place in the United States and the developed countries of western Europe.

China is currently going through a period of continued rapid economic development. People`s living standards are rising continuously, and with them, the amount of energy consumed by buildings.

Figure 1 (below) shows the change in energy consumption per square metre (excluding energy for heating) of urban public buildings over recent years:

Fig. 1. Building energy consumption per square metre for urban public buildings (excluding energy used in heating)

Recently, many builders have begun to construct luxury homes that use central air-conditioning systems to provide constant temperatures and levels of humidity the whole year round. Although some of these residences make use of advanced energy-efficiency technology, their air-conditioning systems still consume – for a number of reasons — far more energy than those in standard home. These systems work over the whole home, rather than in selected areas; they operate continuously, rather than intermittently as needed; and the windows are sealed shut, so are unable to provide natural ventilation.

In southern China, residential compounds have appeared which have a central air-conditioning system for the whole compound. This has led to a huge rise in energy consumption. Patterns of use of domestic appliances also have started to change, leading to further increases in households` energy consumption. Detached houses, which are becoming popular, especially in the north, not only take up more land per household, but also increase the building-surface area per home. This means that they consume far more energy than normal urban flats.

Meanwhile, ordinary office blocks are increasingly being replaced by “modern” office buildings and various kinds of “landmark” buildings. Such buildings are slowly becoming the norm in non-residential urban construction. Although they usually consume many times more energy than ordinary office blocks, all kinds of new buildings – whether offices, schools or university dormitories – are trying to keep up with demands to “attain international standards” and “stay advanced for thirty years”. They are large in size and use central air-conditioning systems, and most of them also use mechanised ventilation systems that make them reliant on large amounts of energy. At the same time, many of the older ordinary public buildings are being renovated and fitted with central air conditioning and sealed windows, turning them from low- to high-energy consumers.

So, we have to ask ourselves a question: in what direction will building energy consumption in China develop? Will we follow the path taken by the US, western Europe and Japan, whereby as the economies grew, people gradually moved into energy-intensive homes and offices? Or will we persist with our current standards of less energy-intensive homes and offices, and even lower our per-square-metre energy consumption through increased social awareness and the use of new energy-efficient technologies?

The question needs to be answered, and the solutions have to be put into practice. If energy-intensive homes and offices become the norm, then with urban construction increasing at a rate of 7% to 8% a year as it currently is, we will follow in the footsteps of the US, western Europe and Japan. And by then it already will be too late to start thinking about the problem.

Our urban development is taking place under completely different conditions to urban development in the US, Europe and Japan. Levels of natural resources to which we have access — especially sources of energy — are far lower than those enjoyed by the developed countries in their periods of development. The pressure on us to protect the environment is far greater than it was for the developed countries.

Urban construction is advancing rapidly across China: from 2000 to 2005, the total surface area of urban buildings doubled. This has led to a rapid rise in the amount of energy consumed by buildings. How do levels of building energy consumption in China compare with those in developed countries? Answering this question provides useful information on the state of architectural energy efficiency in China, and allows us to scientifically plan for future energy-efficiency work and to decide the direction that architectural energy efficiency should take.

Building energy consumption in China can be divided into five main categories: building energy consumption in agricultural areas (“the countryside”); energy consumed through heating in the urban northern areas; domestic building energy consumption in urban areas (excluding heating); energy consumption by ordinary urban public buildings; and energy consumption by large urban public buildings.

Owing to the large development gap between China`s urban and rural areas, building energy-use in the countryside is extremely low compared to urban areas. Therefore, only the last three categories – that is, urban-building energy consumption – will be used when comparing Chinese energy consumption with developed countries. In 2004, the total surface area of urban buildings stood at 14.9 billion square metres. The urban population was 543 million. Statistics show that energy consumption by urban buildings was about 170 million tonnes of standard coal, which accounted for 9% of total coal consumption. Electricity consumption by buildings was 590 billion units — 27% of total consumption.

Figure 1 (below) shows per-capita building energy consumption in China compared to a selection of developed countries. Figure 2 shows building energy consumption per metre squared compared to a selection of developed countries. It can be seen that even with only figures for urban China taken into account, building energy consumption is much lower than the average in developed countries. This is true for both per capita and per unit of area calculations. If figures for the countryside – home to 60% of China`s population and 60% of its buildings – are taken into account, then China`s building energy consumption falls even further below that of developed countries.

Fig. 1. Comparison of per-capita building energy consumption in China and developed countries

Fig. 2. Comparison of building energy consumption per square metre in China and developed countries.