China’s rockiest environmental problem: its soil
中国最麻烦的环境问题是土地污染
Cleaning filthy soil is much harder than cleaning foul air
清洁污染的土地比清洁恶臭的空气更麻烦，更棘手
Jun 8th 2017
2017/06/08
AFTER Donald Trump said on June 1st that America would pull out of the Paris accord on climate change, many people congratulated China for sticking with it. With America on the sidelines, some see China as the leader of the fight against global warming—an idea that the Chinese Communist Party is eager to promote(see Banyan). Although it is the world’s largest emitter of carbon dioxide,China has made a determined effort to cut back. It has burned less coal in each of the past three years. In 2016 it installed more wind-power capacity than any other country; three times as much as the runner-up, America. Some analysts believe that China’s CO{-2} emissions may peak in 2025, five years earlier than the goal it set in Paris. Yet it is premature to call China a champion of greenery.
6月1日，美国总统唐纳德·特朗普宣布美国将退出巴黎气候变化协定。许多人庆祝中国没有退出巴黎协定。美国退出后，中国被当作对抗全球变暖的领导者，而且中国共产党也极力想改变全球变暖的现状。尽管中国是二氧化碳的最大排放者，但是中国下定决心去减少二氧化碳的排放。中国在过去的三年里减少了煤炭的使用。在2016年，中国安装的风能发电设施比其他国家都多，是第二名美国的三倍。有分析者认为中国的二氧化碳的排放量在2025年可能达到顶峰，比在巴黎时设定的提前了5年，因此可以提前称中国为绿化冠军。
Its air and water are notoriously foul. Less noticed, but just as alarming, much of its soil is poisoned, too. As our briefing explains the scale of the problem is hard to gauge, largely because China’s government is so opaque. A soil survey conducted between 2006 and 2011 was at first classified as secret. Many of its findings are still not public, but one grim statistic has emerged: one-fifth of Chinese farmland contains higher-than-permitted levels of pollutants, some of which threaten food safety. This is bad news for a country that has 18% of the world’s population but only 7% of its arable land. And it will be exceptionally costly and difficult to clean up. Soil just sits there, meaning that toxins linger for centuries.
中国的空气和水很臭，但是公众很少注意到，这只是一个警报，中国大量的土地资源也被污染了。正如我们提到的，因为中国政府工作的不透明，所以问题的严重性很难去判断。从2006年到2011年，土地调查报告是处于一级保密状态。到目前为止，许多土地调查报告还是没有公开，除了出现的一个冷酷的数据：中国五分之一的土地含有严重超标的污染物，甚至有的会危害食品安全。对中国，这是一个令人震惊的坏消息，因为中国是一个人口大国，占世界总人口的18%，但是却只有7%的可用土地。因此土地清洁会很难而且花费很大。土地就在那里，意味着有毒物质会持续几百年。
Public alarm is growing. For evidence, ask any Chinese about “cadmium rice”, which contains a heavy metal that, if ingested, can eventually cause kidney failure,lung disease and bone damage. Leaks from factories sometimes seep into paddy fields, and thence into rice-bowls. In 2013 the nation was horrified by a report that in Guangzhou, a southern city, nearly half of the rice tested by inspectors in restaurants and canteens was laced with cadmium. The story aroused a new awareness among citizens: that soil pollution was not just a local problem in China, manifest here and there in the high mortality of“cancer villages”, but a national threat, and that the government had been sparing with the truth about it.
公众恐慌在增加。例如中国镉大米包含了一种重金属物质镉，如果人消化吸收了重金属镉，最终会导致肾衰竭，肺病，骨骼损害。工厂有时会泄露重金属镉，然后镉渗透到稻田，最终到我们的饭碗里。2013年，全国人民被中国广州的一份调查报告吓着了，餐馆使用的大米几乎50%的都被检测出含有重金属镉。这个消息在广大人民群众中引起了新的关注，在中国，土地污染不再是一个简单的当地问题。在癌村里出现的高死亡率到处都是，但是对于全国性的危害，中国政府却一直吝啬着真相。
The government is more forthcoming about air and water pollution. That is because these forms are usually more visible, making them harder to conceal. But it was not until 2013, after years of mounting public anger, that the government began to release real-time data for its biggest cities on levels of PM 2.5, the finest of airborne poisons that lodge deepest in the lungs. A documentary on China’s air pollution, released in 2015 by a Chinese journalist, was scrubbed by censors from Chinese websites after it attracted more than 200m views.
政府乐于提供关于空气和水污染的信息，那是因为这些表格很容易被发现，很难去隐藏。但是直到2013年，多年的不断积累的公共激愤，政府开始公开大城市的PM 2.5的实时数据。PM 2.5是空中有毒物质，它会卡在肺中。在2015年，一位中国记者报道了关于中国空气污染的问题的报道，这份报道吸引200万的浏览，但是这份报道立马被中国的审查局从网站上删除了。
Blue-sky thinking
蓝天计划
Officialsare keenly aware of the public’s anxieties. In 2014 the prime minister, Li Ke qiang,promised that he would “resolutely declare war” on pollution. Last year thegovernment unveiled an almost impossibly ambitious plan to make 90% of pollutedsoil usable by the end of the decade. In March Mr Li promised to “make ourskies blue again”; PM2.5 levels would fall “markedly” this year, he said.
官员强烈地意识到公众的焦虑。在2014年，总理李克强承诺他将向污染问题开战。去年政府公布了一个几乎不可能的计划，10年内，将让90%的污染的土地变成可利用土地。在同年3月，总理李克强承诺会让我们的天空再次变成蓝色的，PM 2.5也将会下降。
All this is welcome, but if China is to lead the world in the creation of a greener planet it must do more than build wind farms and erect solar panels. It must also come clean about the full extent of the problems it faces, and then demand no less from other countries. If the Paris accord is to succeed, transparency will be crucial—because pledges that cannot be verified are of little use in binding countries to a common cause.
所有的诺言都希望可以实现，但是如果中国将领导世界创造一个更绿的星球的话，中国不仅仅是修建风力发电的农场和建立太阳板。中国还要思考所面临的所有问题，最好不要超过几个世纪。如果巴黎协定成功了，透明度将会很重要，因为承诺在联合对抗的国家不能被证实的话不可信。
One way for China to accomplish this would be for it to go beyond the letter of the Paris accord and allow international monitoring of its carbon emissions. At the very least Chinese officials should no longer remain so secretive about other kinds of pollution that pose an immediate threat to the lives of their own compatriots. Openness would enable the Chinese to understand the risks they face, and to hold officials to account for failing to stop polluters from poisoning them. Sunlight—something our readers in Beijing may only dimly remember—is the best anti-pollutant.
对中国一方面要实现这个诺言，比在巴黎协定上的公约还要难，要允许国际监督它的二氧化碳的排放。至少中国官员应该对外公开关于污染的信息，不再保密，因为这些污染物也将会对同盟国有危害。对外公开将让中国的公民了解他们所面临的危害，让官员为没能控制对他们有危害的污染物负责。在北京的读者，阳光，可能是唯一依稀记得的，它是最好的反污染的物质。
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