at home… in China

Another commentary of mine published in the Global Times: China’s Climate Change Opportunity

On the occasion of the “China and Global Climate Change” conference I’m participating in, at Lingnan University in Hong Kong, today and tomorrow – and it even made it into their “Top Stories” links…

Full text below the fold:
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Mao Zedong was born in these parts. Otherwise, there is little of note here in Xiangtan, in the middle of China’s Hunan province. It is typical modern China, as far as China ever gets typical: Apartment blocks and industrial parks, small fields and wide roads. One side of the road, a vegetable market and street food. The other side, fast food joints, a supermarket, and computer shops.

I love it. The challenge of sustainable development lies with normal life – how our desires and practices could contribute to sustainability, and how change towards sustainability would contribute to our–ordinary people’s–well-being.

One noticeable feature of the Chinese landscape are the small vegetable patches. Where there would be a small lawn in the West, nestled alongside apartment blocks, where bushes would be planted on low walls, let alone in the large pit left in the middle of housing development: in China, one often
finds such land used to cultivate a variety of vegetables.

These greens tell a story.

In part, this landscape is a result of China’s position as a developing country. Families are given some land to plant so there is something to fall back on. We tend to overlook how wilderness, too, functions as a potential back-up, as a source of “emergency foods.” This small-scale agriculture also provides some income, or at the very least contributes to variety on the family table. Thinking of “victory gardens” and other urban agriculture, of the present trouble and the good that some fresh, self-grown herbs and vegetables can do for improving nutrition (and decreasing cost), there is something to learn here.

China shows that there is high efficacy – nutrient recycling, food production, and jobs – in small-scale food cultivation, and that it could fit in with urbanization. Local food systems are normal here. On the downside, the effect of environmental pollution is apparent when you can see that it affects the places your food comes from.

Moreover, agricultural activities may be good honest work, but are not good jobs. So, it is predominantly old people who tend such fields. Development progresses the “normal” way: the young study at university and then look for urban jobs and consumerist lifestyles, the government aims for industrialization, pollution decreases environmental health, but lives get better over all.

Returning to the fields, thinking towards the future, there is another lesson in them: These vegetable patches create “cultured nature” with essential functions for humans out of modern marginal lands. They use space and resources effectively, as we will all have to. It is not, however, a behavior borne of a sense of responsibility to the world, or undertaken as a sacrifice for future generations. It is just life. Life based on the fact that we live in this world, as part of it. So, there is little sense in trying to divide it into “culture” here and “nature” there – especially if that meant that we would try to protect unspoiled wilderness far away while forgetting about the impact our “normal” ways of life are having.

China makes this abundantly clear: sustainable development, if it is to be meaningful to us, has to be about making lives better while protecting – better yet, even utilizing – the ecological processes that sustain them. It sounds very commonplace, but not so much has yet been achieved when it comes to integrating ourselves into Earth’s workings. In this regard, the “developed” countries are, at best, at the same level as the “underdeveloped” ones. There is a lot of work to be done – which is just what this time of economic crisis needs.

Friedman (Op-Ed Columnist – Yes, They Could. So They Did. – NYTimes.com) reinforces the point about China’s pivotal role in sustainability…:

We head off down … one of New Delhi’s main streets. The ladies want to show me something. The U.S. Embassy and the Chinese Embassy are both located on Panchsheel, directly across from each other. They asked me to check out the rooftops of each embassy. What do I notice? Let’s see … The U.S. Embassy’s roof is loaded with antennae and listening gear. The Chinese Embassy’s roof is loaded with … new Chinese-made solar hot-water heaters.

Source, just to make sure I mention again that this is a quote: Op-Ed Columnist – Yes, They Could. So They Did. – NYTimes.com

The glitz and glamour of Chinese urban landscapes has come to stand for the country’s rise. Shanghai still runs by the moniker “Paris of the East,” but one sometimes wonders if the time is far away when other cities might be called the Shanghai of the West.
On the other hand, China’s rise has led to increasing awareness of this country’s role in the world, including the central position it will play with regards to sustainability (cp. Liu, Jianguo and Jared Diamond. 2005. China’s environment in a globalizing world. Nature 435:1179-1186). The neon signs and the constant building activity take on a darker meaning in this context. They seem to stand for a future akin to the landscape of “Blade Runner,” with little hope for social development and environmental protection.

In all the lights, a hope and a lesson is hidden. Hidden, literally, in the dark.
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