Published by Global Village of Beijing

We choose a frog as the symbol of our newsletter, not only for making it lively and interesting, but to remind ourselves and other grassroots of the extension of its meaning---Never jump out of the grassland and pond - the public, in which we are established; Keep voicing our opinions since it is our function and mission; Look upon our behaviors from diversified points of views and realize self-promotion with tolerance and interdependence; and Strive to make our frog jump to keep up with the pace of international NGOs through capacity building.

One frog can only give a weak murmur, yet voices from numerous frogs can be heard throughout the world. One frog has very limited strength, while efforts made by numerous frogs can strike hearts of the public and inspire their participation in our green Earth construction.

Please share your updates, events and information on environmental issues with us. We sincerely look forward to your articles, comments and every possible support.

Sheri Liao
President, Global Village of Beijing

Introduction to Voices of Grassroots (Back To Top)

Voices of Grassroots is a monthly newsletter, which voices the opinions and activities of Chinese environmental NGOs. It is designed as an information platform to promote the participation of Chinese grassroots organizations in China's sustainable development.

Voices of Grassroots aims to strengthen collaboration between grassroots organizations, governments, and the business sector by updating environmental activities, policies and laws, and public ideas. Additionally, it seeks to assist NGOs in their capacity building efforts by sharing the experiences of relevant organizations and experts. Finally, it endeavors to expand the influence of NGOs nationwide through dissemination on a broad scale.

Voices of Grassroots is published by Global Village of Beijing, with current funding support from the Canadian Civil Society Programme. In each publication, an extensive amount of content comes directly from people who are either working with or are otherwise associated with Chinese environmental NGOs. With an editing panel that consists of leaders and researchers from governments, the business sector, and NGOs, Voices of Grassroots is positioned to be an effective platform through which the voices of grassroots organizations can be heard.

NGO Express (Back To Contents)

On July 26 th , more than 100 residents from Dongsi Olympic Community gathered together to advocate the 26 Degree Campaign.
Enlarging the influence of the 26 Degree Campaign to local residents is an important goal of NGOs to implement the concept of the “Green Olympics”. Residents learnt from the activity tips on energy saving, knowledge on air pollution and environmental protection and expressed their will of making a better home for everyone.

Award Ceremony for Participating Partners of 26 Degree Campaign (Back)

On July 16th, the 6 Chinese NGOs held the first Award Ceremony for the first 10 participating partners of the 26 Degrees Campaign at the Sino-Swiss Hotel, the very first hotel that has agreed on setting their air conditioners to 26 degrees.
Besides awarding the partners for their efforts to environmental protection, with the ceremony the NGO alliance intended to draw more public attention to the campaign and hoped to encourage more participation in the activities for the sake of the environment and people's health.
Until September 26th, NGOs will keep advocating the campaign and convincing more hotels, embassies, shopping centers and other public places into it to contribute together to energy saving.

“Cool the Earth, Green the Olympic” 713 Action (Back)

More than 40 Chinese NGOs have joined into the 26 Degree Campaign and several hotels, office buildings and other public places have become official partners. On July 13 th , the three year anniversary for China winning the Olympic bid, NGO representatives and environmental volunteers organized a bike tour to further advocate the 26 Degree Campaign. Participants set off from Beijing Working People's Culture Palace at 9:30 am, distributed flyers and collected people's signature on the way. The last stop was the office of the Olympic Committee, located in the Qinglan Building. Representatives of the campaign passed the “26 Degrees Campaign Open Letter to the Public” to the Deputy Director Mr. Yu. In the letter it is stated that the 40 NGOs are hoping to create public awareness about environmental problems, and to implement practical actions in everyone's daily life to save energy – by switching the air condition to at least 26 degrees.

--26 Degree Campaign
For more information on 26 Degree Campaign, please see: www.26c.ngo.cn

Cleaner Drinking Water Program (Back)

The Huaihe Guards started a cleaner drinking water program in “cancer village”, where cancer has become common because of bad water quality. To deal with the problem, the first deep-dug well was built, which received full financial support from the local government. The Huaihe Guards are seeking for support for this program from either individuals or enterprises. Their hope is that the villagers will have clean drinking water and won't have to suffer from cancer soon.
CCTV has made a documentary film about water pollution called “A village and a river”, which describes the situation in the cancer village.

Nu River Journalist Forum (Back)

Nu River Journalist Forum was held on July 21 st . Representative of UNESCO introduced relevant problems to the 28 th Session of the World Heritage Conference and answered questions regarding the dam building issue on Nu River. He pointed out that such project in the core area of the protected site should be reported to the World Heritage Committee before applying to be a world heritage.
Others who have just come back from the southwest showed many pictures and talked about their experience on the trip. Journalists intensively discussed on how to better protect world heritages in China, stop inappropriate dam building on Nu River and the Tiger Leaping Gorge and achieve a rational development in the end. They gave many constructive ideas such as gather more opinions from specialists, voice out for local residents and use the power of media.

The 9 th Sustainable Energy Journalist Forum on BRT (Back)

On July 21 st , the 9 th sustainable energy journalist forum was held at China International Technology Convention Center. This is the first journalist forum after the Energy Journalist Award ceremony on June 12 th . More than 40 journalists joined this forum, as well as interested volunteers.
The topic this time is BRT—Bus Rapid Transit, which is an ideal transportation method for buses around the world. However in China, it has just started.
The number of automobiles in Beijing has already exceeded 2 million. How to use least cars to transport most people, how to make the roads more efficient, how to make buses faster have become urgent problems. This time, the forum invited engineer Xu Kangming, professor Zhang Xuekong and Dr. He Dongquan to give an overall introduction to BRT system.
Journalists asked many questions concerning efficiency and feasibility of BRT system and gave their opinions and suggestions to BRT.
At the end, Dr. Yang of the Energy Foundation and Sheri Liao from Global Village of Beijing gave conclusion and comments to the forum.

Extent Education on Renewable Energy (Back)

Three schools in Xiang-Fan City, Hunan Province, have been chosen as experimental schools for an educational renewable energy program.
The program, the textbooks and other facilities were developed by IED—Institute of Environment and Development, one of the leading environmental NGOs in China. IED is building up a network of experimental schools for renewable energy education around the nation. The curriculum includes general knowledge about energy issues and technical details, i.e. how the windmill is spinning. But there are also practical parts included, e.g. teaching the students to make their own solar energy ship model. Students have shown great interest and willingness to learn more.

Book Donation (Back)

The Sand Band, a band that has always been active in environmental protection, and Green Web, an environmental NGO, are organizing a book donation campaign in bars in Beijing. This book are donated to kids in Western mountainous areas where students have almost no access to books other than their text books.
The aim of the campaign is to provide simple scientific knowledge to those kids and to offer them a wider view of the world, making them understand more about the importance of environmental protection for example. The books are expected to be:

1. Clean, and not fake (including VCDs, software etc.)
2. Suitable for kids aged from 7 to 13, best including both pictures and text
3. Related to environmental protection, natural sciences, flora and fauna, etc.
4. Stationery and music instruments are accepted
5. Novels and textbooks are not accepted

You can either visit the Green Web's webpage ( www.greenweb.org ) or donate books to the bars that are participating in this activity. Please see the Chinese version of Voices of Grassroots for the names of the bars.

CESDRRC's Book Exhibition on Renewable Energy (Back)

With financial support from the German Heinrich-Boell-Foundation, the China Environment & Sustainable Development Reference & Research Center (CESDRRC) has recently gathered a large number of Chinese and English books and materials on renewable energy. From the collection we have compiled a book exhibition in the CESDRRC library. The exhibition is opened July and can be visited Mondays to Fridays from 8:30 to 17:00. The six-months event will be accompanied by a series of public lectures by experts in this field. The CESDRRC is a public library specialized in the environment and sustainable development. Please contact us if you wish to receive regular information about our events and/or our newsletter: aiwastar@163bj.com .
Address: Sino-Japan Friendship Center for Environmental Protection, Room 701,Yuhui Nanlu 1 (Shaoyaoju) Chaoyang District, 100029 Beijing
For directions please call: 84636363 or see map on our website: www.chinaeol.net/cesdrrc  

Recruitment of LEAD Associates Cohort 11 (Back)

Leadership for Environment and Development (LEAD) is a network of over 1,700 professionals in 80 countries who practice and contribute to sustainable development at all levels of society.
Recruitment to this network is through a challenging and unique international training program. LEAD is seeking applications from committed individuals who wish to join our 11th cohort of participants.
The training involves 35 days over a 12-month period and will begin at the end of 2004. At the end of their training, graduates join the powerful network of LEAD Fellows.
The deadline for receipt of applications is: 31 October 2004.
LEAD is now accepting applications from outstanding individuals. For further information on deadlines, details of program fees and scholarship opportunities visit
http://www.lead.org.cn/lead/recruitment/recruitment.htm .

--Institute of Environment and Development

Enjoy your Trip (Back)

Reading and traveling are both good ways to pursue a deeper understanding of life. This summer, the Beijing Brooks Education Center (BBEC) will invite individual travelers to hold speeches about their travel experiences. The first lecture of this series was held July 10th in Box Coffee Shop. Luo-Yi, a fan of exploring nature, introduced his travel experiences in the past and his future plan on swimming across straits, walking through deserts, climbing up the Himalayas and so forth (he has already swum across the Qiongzhou Strait—between Guangdong and Hainan Province).

BBEC aims at providing the public with different angles to view the world and to express themselves and they hope that their lecture series will become an effective platform for communications of specialists and public.

Warning and Pollution (Back To Contents)

* Alarm Sounded - Five Chinese World Heritage Sites Reevaluated
* Disaster or Miracle? -Yun Nan: Nearly 5 Million Acres of Eucalypts Will Be Planted

Alarm Sounded - Five Chinese World Heritage Sites Reevaluated (Back)

Written by: Wang Yongchen, Translated by: Wang Feng

Every five years, the United Nations reviews each World Heritage Site to assess its status. If it has been damaged or severely altered, UN will move it to the World Heritage in Danger List. If the situation is not alleviated, it will be dropped from as a World Heritage Site. It is estimated that among the 700 World Heritage Sites, 31 have been moved to the Danger List.

At the 28th session of the World Heritage Committee (WHC) of UNESCO in Suzhou, the 15th item for discussion is to reevaluate 121 World Heritage Sites, five of which reside in China, including the Three Parallel Rivers of Yunnan Protected Areas.

When the Three Parallel Rivers was added as a World Heritage Site, WHC evaluated it to be “an epicenter of China's biodiversity”. Northwest Yunnan is the area of the richest biodiversity in China and may be the most biologically diverse temperate region on Earth. The site encompasses most of the natural habitats in the Hengduan Mountains, one of the world's most important remaining areas for the conservation of the Earth's biodiversity. The outstanding topographic and climatic diversity of the site, coupled with its location at the juncture of the East Asia, Southeast Asia, and Tibetan Plateau bio-geographical realms and its function as a N-S corridor for the movement of plants and animals (especially during the ice ages), marks it as a truly unique landscape, which still retains a high degree of natural character despite thousands of years of human habitation. “As the last remaining stronghold for an extensive suite of rare and endangered plants and animals, the site is of outstanding universal value.” Nu River, one of the three rivers that run parallel, is the only one that's still “running freely” (meaning without any dams to stop it) in Southeast Asia. Building dams on it will destroy the biodiversity and the natural environment.

On June 30th, 2003 at its 27th convention, the WHC spent only 18 minutes considering the application of the Three Rivers and granting the inscription. It is the only site in China that has met all four criteria laid out by the WHC. Yet, only a year later……

Already the convention marked the 2nd time the Three Parallel Rivers has been reevaluated. WHC expressed its concern before that too much tourism might destroy the site. Now WHC worries about the proposed 13 dams to be built on Nu River, with one inside the protected areas and the other 12 close by. The reevaluation is sounding the alarm on our inefficiency in protecting World Heritages Sites.

During the last several years, the conflict between China's economic development and culture protection has intensified. Dams and tourist facilities have been built on many famous natural sites. The famed Tiger Leaping Gorge will probably be gone after the proposed dam is built there.

A lack of unified, authoritative and competent environmental protection agencie is at the core of China's problems. The overlapping responsibilities of different agencies under various state departments confused the local governments and made it difficult to implement state policies.

Take building dams on Nu River for example: starting from last August till now, Chinese scholars, environmentalists, NGOs, Yunnan local government, and power plants have had vehement discussions of its necessity and its potential damage to the environment. People who support it argued that the dam would help alleviate poverty in that area. They sneered at those who oppose the project to be heartless city folks who had nothing better to do with their time. The opponents pointed out the importance of protecting the co-existence of the biodiversity and the culture diversity in this area.

He Shaoling, representative of the environment and resources protection commission under the National People's Congress and Deputy Chief Engineer at China Institute of Water Resources and Hydropower Research, stated that it is required by law that before a dam is constructed, an Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) has to be submitted. Unfortunately by now, not enough emphasis has been put on the EIAs in practice.

He Shaoling's view is shared by a group of hydropower experts, who suggest that dam construction should be carefully thought through with long vision. They understood developing hydropower was an important strategy set by the government to develop its west region where one finds abundant water resources, and are protected areas for the rare and valuable animals and plants to China and the world. It is also home to some unique topography and scenic places in the world.

A simple review of the world history of hydropower development shows that a set of regulatory procedures has been followed before a dam is constructed in western countries. Public participation has played important roles in evaluating the impact on the economy, society, and the bio-environment, thanks to the transparent information made available.

The author of this article has learnt that the General Director of WHC wrote to China's World Heritage center on February 20th, stating that when the Three Rivers was inscribed as a World Heritage Site, nothing was mentioned about building a dam on it, but that after its inscription such information has been reaching his ears constantly. By writing the letter, he wished to receive from the government some official information about this matter, and to learn about China's policies to protect its World Heritage Sites.

Regretfully, by April 20th, WHC had still not received any response. Soon, they wrote a second letter expressing severe concerns and a formal reply was demanded this time. The letter urged the Chinese government to reply to the cry from scholars, environmentalists, and scientists to let the river run freely. The letter recognized the importance of producing energy and its meaning to Yunnan, but suggested the central government seek other energy sources in order to keep intact this outstanding World Heritage Site. Still, they didn't receive any reply.

After the Three Rivers had been successfully inscribed as a World Heritage Site, Wu Xiaoqing, the Deputy Governor of Yunnan Province said that it this is equivalent to receiving a Nobel Prize for a country's cultural, historical or natural inheritance. This unique site contains rare topography, bio and cultural diversity, natural beauty in an endless mountain range. It's an important gene database for the world. He said environmental protection should precede economic development when the two are found in conflict. The standard of the World Heritage Committee should be strictly followed, he stressed, that long-term benefit should be brought into the consideration of the short-term profit.

All that said, now China has 5 sites under re-evaluation including the Three Rivers, which was inscribed just a year ago, making it the youngest World Heritage Site

But is this a surprise? Do we understand that protecting a World Heritage Site requires an understanding of natural and cultural inheritances, a set of laws and regulations, a recognized priority to protect environment before economic development, an acknowledged responsibility and obligation by the country where the World Heritage resides to the international community? Do we understand that many systems in nature are still unknown to mankind? If we understood, would we still want to build 13 dams on Nu River? Would we still let a World Heritage Site be re-evaluated so soon?

Zhang Xinsheng, the Chairman of the 28th Convention, said that China, as a country of abundant natural resources, knows its obligation and responsibility toward the international society. It should and will be able to keep the Three Rivers intact. It simply has to be done.

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Disaster or Miracle? -Yun Nan: Nearly 5 Million Acres of Eucalypts Will Be Planted (Back)

Translated by: Chen Mei (Global Village of Beijing)

Last August, at the Kunming International Trade Festival, APP, the biggest paper-making company in Asia, signed a contract with Wenshan County of Yunnan Province and promised to invest $1.8 billion on planting 991 thousand of acres of paper material trees and building up paper mills. In addition, APP proposed to invest more than $4 billion in an even bigger project, including planting, pulping, and paper-making in Simao and Lincang Counties of Yunnan Province as well. Totally, APP planned to plant approximately 5 million acres eucalyptus trees in Yunnan.

From the beginning, the project of APP brought up arguments between governments and ecology scientists.

Professor Duan Changqun of Yunnan University argued that the project would do tremendous harm to the fragile natural environment of the related areas. He explained, “The mountain ecosystems of Wenshan are now recovering through years of protection. The so-called “mountainous barrens” which were proposed to plant eucalyptus trees in, have already been able to form a valuable natural ecosystems. To ruin the current ecosystems and plant artificial eucalyptus forests will definitely lead to ecological degradation. He also introduced some of their research results: as a foreign species, eucalyptus is very not harmonizing well with original natural environment. Planting large amount of such trees in one region will lead to serious ecological crisis, such as lean soil, reduction of native biodiversity and ecological degradation. Additionally, paper-making contaminants are still a difficult problem worldwide. There are no perfect solutions to the problem yet.

Wang Song of the Chinese Academy of Sciences warned: “There were many countries trying to import eucalypts. But in the 1990s, due to the objection of many scientists, the World Bank has already stopped all financial support for these kinds of projects.

Professor Yang Yuming of Southwest Forestry College agreed with Professor Duan: “During the meetings in the US, experts from all over the world worried about APP's plan of planting large amounts of eucalyptus trees in China. For references, New Zealand had cut down all the eucalyptus trees they had imported before.”

APP's projects, however, are “a great opportunity” for the local governments. An official of the Yunnan Provincial Government considered that it is the right time to develop under the help from APP's projects, and that the project will improve the living standard of local people in those areas. Chen Yuliang, the Project Director of Wenshan County, even provided several attractive figures: a 600-thousand-tons pulp mill could offer 12 thousand jobs and the whole project of APP could add 42.5 billion RMB additional taxes annually.

So what is the attitude of the local farmers? As a reporter said, "Their point of view is quite different from the one of experts and government officials. They tend to pay more attention to their own benefits. The farmers know neither the dispute, nor the disadvantages of eucalyptus. However, eventually planting eucalyptus trees would affect their long-term benefits, or even their whole future.

What current stage is APP's project at?

Due to the fact that the so-called “mountain barrens”are much smaller than the total areas proposed to plant eucalyptus, it is reported that many forests will “have to” be sacrificed. In order to achieve the project goal, probably 1 million acres of natural forest in Simao and 300 thousand acres of natural forest in Wenshan will be replaced by eucalyptus.

As Professor Duan Chanqun mentioned, planting large amount of simplex foreign tree species would lead to enormous local climate change, and alien species like eucalypts may possibly imperil the local biodiversity.

Is it a miracle or disaster? It is still suspense.

Different people have different opinions. One of the local officials argued: “Every coin has two sides: the project will bring tremendous benefits, but it also has some drawbacks." But one anonymous forestry expert said straightly: “Although development is the common goal, there are still many options to choose from. The key point is how to balance the short-term profits and long-term benefits. While investors and officials are seeking the short-term profits, the local farmers have to endure all the negative results in the future.”

So far, the project has got support from the local government of Yunnan, and the total project planning was finished and presented to the National Development and Reform Committee despite all the objections.

Development is similar to a gymnastic athlete jumped on a balance beam. He must find the balance point to move forward and prevent from falling down to the ground. To find this balance point of development, we have to have wisdom, perseverance and responsibility, because any decisions we make will be judged by the future and later generations.

A link to APP in Hainan:

APP's eucalyptus projects information in Hainan Province

1994, APP started an 8 years eucalyptus planting and paper-making project in Hainan Province, which was APP's biggest project in China.

In the past years, more and more natural forests were damaged in Hainan Province. In addition, according to the official statistics, more fires were recorded and among the recorded fires, about 1/8 were caused directly by the eucalyptus planting companies. Furthermore, experts found serious soil degradation in the artificial planting areas. As a local saying says: “In eucalyptus forests, there are no birds in the sky and no grass on the ground”.

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NGO Corner (Back To Contents)

An open call to all citizens to participate in WWF China's 26 Degrees Campaign (Back)

The 13th of July, 2001 is a day Chinese people will never forget. On that day, millions of people rushed into the streets to celebrate Beijing's successful bid for the Beijing 2008 Olympic Games. One reason for the successful bid was China's commitment to host a green Olympics. But have we, the Chinese people, ever thought of what we can do as individuals to make this happen?

On June 26 this year, six environmental organizations (Global Village Beijing (GVB), World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF), Friends of Nature (FoN), Institute for Environment and Development (IED), China Association for NGO Cooperation (CANGO) and the Green Earth Volunteers) started the 26 Degrees Campaign. The Beijing-based campaign aims to promote energy conservation through raising the temperature of our air-conditioners to 26 degrees or above.

The campaign will be held for 3 months, ending on September 26. The campaign targets hotels, shopping malls, office buildings, other public areas and private homes, calling upon them to set their air conditioners at 26°C or higher. Doing this will save electricity, thereby making a positive contribution to the environment.

The 26 Degrees Campaign has already received the support and cooperation of some 40 environmental organizations throughout China. In Beijing, the Sino-Swiss Hotel, the Kempinski Hotel,two Novotels, Beijing International Hotel and the Great Wall Sheraton Hotel, the Nigerian and the Spanish Embassy and Wenhuagong in the Beijing Working People's Culture Palace have officially declared their support and participation, and have set their air conditioning systems to 26°C.

There is currently wide media coverage on this topic, making people aware of the goal of the campaign, and persuading companies, state organizations and households to take concrete action.

That is why we are directing this letter to you: to participate in this campaign. Change begins in each and every one of us. Your action will make a difference!

Saving electricity and water, recycling, the protection of endangered species and green consumption all contribute to a green Olympics. In the summer, another contribution you can make is to join the 26 Degrees Campaign, and set your air conditioners to 26°C or higher.

One contributor to global warming and the unsustainable use of natural resources are air conditioners. To support our excessive use of air conditioners, huge amounts of coal are dug and dams are constructed to generate more electricity. These activities put the ecological and biological balance of nature in danger. This situation strongly affects our country in a negative way. It is our responsibility as consumers and citizen to ensure that nature is in harmony both now and for a long time to come, for ourselves, for our children and for future generations.

After the 2004 Athens Olympic Games, the focus of the world will shift to Beijing and China. People will not only pay attention to sports in the arenas, but also the environment surrounding it. This is dependent on the Chinese people's consciousness and actions toward our environment. Throughout China's more than 5000-year history, attention has been paid to harmony between people and nature and the protection of animals and plants. Our culture relies on our co-existence with nature and other species.

But the environment in China today is in its most fragile state in history, with pressure from the world's largest population and rapid development. Something must be done. Let us start with the smallest of actions to protect our environment - cooling our planet and making the Olympics greener. The future of sustainable development in China and the welfare of the next generation are in our hands!

We urge you to join the 26 Degrees Campaign. Your actions, no matter how small, make a difference!

- Global Village Beijing (GVB), World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF), Friends of Nature (FoN), Institute for Environment and Development (IED), China Association for NGO Cooperation (CANGO) and the Green Family

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Why are Chinese enterprises absent at the 26 Degree Campaign? (Back)

The 26 Degree Campaign has started a month ago. More and more organizations are joining while some hotels and office buildings have become official participants. However, it is notable that most of these official participants, for instance, Sino-Swiss Hotel and Kempinski Hotel, are foreign companies. Very few Chinese hotels and office buildings have showed interest in this social activity.

Now we ask the question: WHY? Why are most Chinese companies ignorant about social activities? On the one hand, I consider, this stems from a lack of environmental awareness in most Chinese firms. On the other hand, this shows how much Chinese companies admire “power” while they do not care much about their social responsibility. From a holistic point of view, this is still due to lacking knowledge on environmental protection and sustainable development.

Hence it is no doubt that Chinese enterprises that are run in such atmosphere are ignorant about environmental issues. Of course, this ignorance is also related to the level of the whole country's technological development and other objective reason.

However, one other main reason, in my opinion, is that this campaign is held by NGOs, not the government. If this was an official campaign, the situation would probably be very different. In the process of building up a market economy, China still has a long way to go. So far, the importance of NGOs is not seen by most Chinese enterprises yet and therefore NGOs have a comparatively small influence on enterprises.

Looking at the future of China's market economy, the trend is already non-resistible. I believe that it is not long before the whole Chinese society realizes the importance of the third social sector—the civil society and NGOs, and it is not long before Chinese enterprises acknowledge their social responsibility and take action.

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A letter to UNESCO (Back)

From the editor: This is a letter co-written by 43 representatives from 23 organizations. These people have been worried about severe environmental destruction brought by uncontrolled development and have tried their best to stop the construction of a big hydro project in the county of Nu River. Now they are writing this letter to UNESCO to express their willingness to help protect the world heritages in China.

To the World Heritage Convention and the UNESCO World Heritage Center:

We are 43 representatives from 23 units around the country that are worried about one of the world natural properties in China—the 'Three Parallel Rivers'. We represent non-government organizations, researchers, journalists and aborigines living in that area.

We assembled in the Dujiangyan city of Sichuan Province on June 30 th and carried on a discussion on " dam-building in southwest China and bio-diversity protection ".

We have been paying close attention to the natural heritages of southwest China for a long time, and have promoted extensive research in the area of the " Three Parallel Rivers ", which is under serious threat from hydropower development. Hence we are drafting this letter together to submit our request to the World Heritage Center.

“Three Parallel Rivers” is the first large-scale natural heritage in China. It has met all the four standards for world heritages. This is not only unique in China, but also rare in the world in the 30 years history of the List of World Heritages. However, the Nu River hydropower plan will completely destroy the authenticity of the “Three Parallel Rivers”

Early this year in February, Prime Minister Wen Jiabao gave instruction on cautiously studying and scientifically deciding the development in Nu Jiang Area. Even this did not stop some people from implementing the project.

The people insisted on building the dam propagated through various medias saying that the protected area of the “Three Parallel Rivers” does not include the Nu Rivers, because the protected area only includes those that are above 2,000 meters, and the plan (although some of the planned dams are as high as 250 meters) of the cascaded development only involves the areas under 2,000 meters, and therefore will not influence the site of the world heritage at all. They even hinted that this is a concept that UNESCO has agreed on.

We feel that such statement is not convincing, because dam construction itself is already breaking the second, third and fourth principle for being a world heritage: a site that represents important and evolving ecological process; a site that has extraordinary natural beauty and aesthetic importance; a site that is remarkable, bio-diverse and a habitat to endangered species.

From our point of view, the protected target of a world heritage should include the whole area that is related to the site geographically, ecologically and bio-diversely.

Once the dam is built, the Nu River will be turned from a great and free flowing river to a bunch of close-to-each-other reservoirs. This will make a fundamental change to the whole area's natural, geographical and ecological system. We will also be facing an uncontrollable loss of species.

There are more than 50 species of fish in Nujiang basin, among them 40% is a peculiar kind. The dam will cause disappearance of many water-migratory species, including the Anguilla nebulosa—a kind of fish that travels as far as 1,500 km.

The disappearance of the species will have a big impact on the aquatic ecosystem. This is totally the opposite to the purpose of the world natural heritage.

What makes us more worried is the change of the geographical features brought by dam and reservoir building, as well as the impact on local people and their culture. In fact, many hydropower projects on the Jinsha River and the Langcang River have already been proofed to have serious negative impact on geology, environment and society. These are not only destructions to the world heritage, but at the same time, a lesson for the development at Nu River area. Recently, we hear that the World Heritage Center is considering a re-evaluation of the “Three Parallel Rivers” because of the dam construction. We all agree on this decision and at the same time, we are hoping that this assessment will take in suggestions from NGOs and scientists. We have specialists from different fields as well as environmental sources that we would like to offer possible assistance for the assessment.

Sincerely, we are hoping that this Suzhou conference will improve the effectiveness of world heritage protection and seriously deal with the protection of the “Three Parallel Rivers” site. We look forward to your reply to our request!

Thank you!

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Policy Watch (Back To Contents)

* Electricity Crisis 2004
* Save electricity—Government's action!
* Save electricity—NGO's actionSave
* electricity—Public's action

From the editor: The present domestic electricity supply is tense. This problem is caused by the overheating Chinese economy, while at the same time it reflects the profound problems in the past 20 years economic development, namely high energy consumption of each unit product, low efficiency of coal burning and extensive and wasteful usage of energy. This situation has been triggered especially since last year when high energy-consuming projects were invested in some certain areas.

Electricity Crisis 2004 (Back)
Written by: Caofeng (Global Village of Beijing)

Electricity Shortage! Even before the recent peak of electricity usage, most parts of China had already suffered from insufficient electricity. On 11 th of June, the whole country used 5.9 billion KWh, which was the highest record in history (set last year on 29 th of July). Also, the peak of electricity use came 10 days early this year, which has put the electricity grids in the most difficult situation ever. This summer, the whole nation will be short of 30 million KW of electricity!

Save electricity—Government's action! (Back)

1. Facing the early peak of electricity usage this year, the Chinese government has organized a public campaign to raise people's awareness on energy saving. The Energy Saving Week Campaign, which was normally held in November, was brought forward to June this year. On 3 rd of June, a press conference was held at Beijing International Hotel. Participating journalists found that the air conditioning was a lot warmer than before. This was because it was turned two degrees up to save energy.
During the campaign, the government used all kinds of media to advocate and popularize awareness and methods of saving energy.

2. On June 15 th , the National Development and Reform Commission announced the adjustment of the price of electricity from 4 grids: the Southern China grid, Eastern China grid, Central China grid and Northern China grid. The price of each Kwh of electricity would rise by 2.2 fen. It was reported that a plan to raise electricity prices in the Northeast and the Northwest grids is under study and would take place within the next few days. This adjustment is mainly concerned with industrial, agricultural and commercial use, while the electricity price of residential use has remained the same.
This year, to deal with electricity shortages in 9 special areas (Beijing, Shanghai etc.), the government has come out with a “time-shift” price system, according to which electricity is charged differently at different times in a day to average electricity use during a day. At places where hydro power is main source of electricity, a “season-shift” price system was started, which actively reduced the pressure on electricity grids.

3. Except making the mandatory standard, the government's leading role has a strong social-demonstrative effect. From July 1st to August 31st, all governmental offices are required to turn their air conditioning to the minimum of 26 degrees, with a limitation to use air conditioning only between of 9 o'clock to 17 o'clock. From July 15th to August 15th, non-continuous factories are required to give a one-week holiday to their workers under the Electricity Supply Plan (ESP). From July 8th to August 31st, non-continuous enterprises are required to adjust their working time under ESP. Shanghai government has turned off the street decoration lights at peak time; Beijing will practice the “season-shift” price system, hoping to reduce electricity use at peak times. Setting air conditioners at 26 degrees in hotels, shopping malls and office buildings, changing the timing of streetlights and other methods are also being implemented to overcome the electricity shortage.

Save electricity—NGO's action (Back)

June 26th , Global Village of Beijing, WWF, CANGO, Friends of Nature, Green Earth, IED and more than 30 other NGOs initiated the 26 Degree Campaign to reduce air conditioning energy consumption and to alleviate the severe electricity shortage. In this campaign, NGOs are hoping that:
1.The government departments at all levels will take the leading role in energy saving by setting their air conditioners at 26 degrees.
2.International bodies and industrial sector will join the campaign and actively support the effort.
3. All citizens and families will take action - every individual must start by themselves.

Save electricity—Public's action (Back)

Due to the electricity shortage, a term that has been forgotten in currently prosperous China, “economize” has became a hot terminology in media. The vice prime minister Zeng Peiyan said: one way to deal with the electricity shortage is to develop more resources, the other is to save, and the key is to save! On the opening of the Energy Saving Week Campaign, he walked in the venue and talked to citizens about energy saving. He calculated: we have a population of 1.3 billion in China, if everyone saved one KWh of electricity, we could save more than 200 million tons of coal! The public reacted actively and expressed their willingness to start themselves: turn their air conditioning to 26 degrees; do not keep electrical appliances under “waiting” mode, use “green” light bulbs and so on.
Under this severe electricity shortage, we have seen positive reactions from government, companies and the public and we have faith that we will overcome this difficulty!

Women, Youth and Environment (Back To Contents)

The Little Girl from Shenzhen, “the Ambassador of Environment”

Editted by: Zhangdongqing (Global Village of Beijing)

On September 2nd, 2002, Liao Mingyu, an 11 years old girl attended the World Summit on Sustainable Development (WSSD), which was held in Johannesburg, South Africa, as the only representative of all youths in Asia.

At the beginning of the conference, Liao Mingyu made a speech with 3 other children from Canada, Ecuador and South Africa.

These 4 children expressed the aspiration of the children all over the world. Their words were: 'Children all over the world are despaired of the adults, as they care too much about money and wealth, instead of caring for those who are essential for our future. Just think about your children, and think about what a world you would like to leave to them.'

'We cannot buy a new globe. Why don't we punish the nations and people who have destroyed our environment?'

'We are here to express our hope to all governments that they will make sure all the people from developing countries will have access to clean drinking water, that they will sign the Kyoto Protocol, limit the production of personal automobiles, provide children with fundamental medical service, stop excessive deforestation and give the poor more support.'

'We call on all people: walk more, ride bicycles more and raise efficiency of transportation, reduce traffic pollution; try your best to stop wasting resources, and achieve the goal of recycling and a more efficient utilization of resources.'

At the end of their speech, the children said to the leaders in a challenging tone,' Do not forget our proposal when you leave. If you do not take action right now, we will challenge you eventually.'

The children's speech evoked warm acclamations. Liao Mingyu, the naïve and confident Chinese girl, who speaks English fluently, became the focus of the conference.

Liao Mingyu, Grade 4, was a student in the Shenzhen primary School. On the 5th of June 2002, Shenzhen held a campaign for World Environment Day. At that time, Klaus Toepfer—the vice secretary of the United Nations, was impressed by the garden city of Shenzhen. Later on, WSSD decided to choose one child from Shenzhen to be the representative at WSSD.

Shenzhen primary School concentrates a lot on environmental education. They hold environmental activities throughout the year. Therefore, they were honored to select the representative. Liao Mingyu defeated many candidates and became the representative in the end.

Liao Mingyu is a lovely and frank girl with sensitive awareness of environment protection. She saves energy, never litters, switches off the light when going out, and often tells the adults to do so as well. In 2001, she went to Chicago with her parents and began her one-year life abroad. Facing new friends and environment, Mingyu showed a high adaptability. At first her grade was average, but after working hard, she finally got A+ in many subjects.

On December 27 th , 2002, three days after her 11 year-old birthday, Mingyu—the Ambassador of the Environment, was selected to take part in the vocal experiment in the Beijing Space Control Centre, her new year bless was sent to the space and then transferred back to the land, broadcasted to the people all over the country.

On July 12 th 2004, Liao Mingyu set off to Connecticut to take part in the World Children Environment Conference from July 19 th to 23 rd . The topic of this conference was 'resources protection' and nearly 300 children from all over the world attended. Mingyu held a speech 'Let's Take Action'. When she was answering the questions form the press, she said, there are lots of people talking about environmental protection, but few of them really take action. Environmental protection cannot be achieved by talking about it only, but by doing it. People need to take action and make their wishes true.

She also said that she would like to introduce lessons and experiences her school, community and city have had concerning environmental protection to all the children. At the conference, as the representative of Shenzhen Primary School, Mingyu recommended two environmental protection programs. One was Mingyu's own environmental protection website, the other was and environmental project of her school. Meanwhile, she used slides to introduce the achievements of environmental protection in Shenzhen during the past 20 years.

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WSSD Followup(Back To Contents)

From the editor: As the follow up of the Bonn International Conference for Renewable Energy, we have chosen this article on Sales of Green Energy written by Ms. Yin from the Global Climate Change Program of WWF. This article was originally written in Chinese and this English version is a very brief summary of the original one. Please see the Chinese copy if you are interested in more detailed information. Also, this article is divided into two parts and the second part will be published in the next issues.

Sales of Green Energy—Market power on development of renewable energy

WWF Yinchuntao

Summary

Based on the analysis of barriers to renewable energy development in China, the author concluded that the current structure of the power sector and tariff regulations of the retail market were the bottle-neck of renewable energy development. They also contribute to the inefficiency of policy implementations that aim to up-scale the renewable energy market and reduce costs. The green power market, which has been growing very fast in Europe and the United States recently, could be a possible approach to deal with the problems. After a review of the international green power market experience and an analysis of a potential for it in Beijing, the author suggests the government to encourage utility or power companies in big metropolis, such as Beijing and Shanghai, to initiate a green power market and create a preferable market environment for green power development.

Barriers for the development of Green Energy

Green Energy includes: wind power, solar energy, geothermal heat and biomass. Due to the destructive effect on surrounding ecosystems, big hydro plants are not considered “green” in this essay. This is not an academic definition.

Distribution of Green Energy in China

Theoretically, the total amount of useable wind power in China is 253 million KW, which, if fully used, could reduce the emission of CO2 by 600 million tons. However, wind power is mainly distributed in Inner Mongolia, Xinjiang, Heilongjiang and Gansu Province, in total 50% of the whole nation's wind power.

Geothermal heat is expected to produce 5,800 MW of electricity. This kind of renewable energy is generally distributed in Tibet and Yunan. It has an obvious advantage in winter and it is comparatively stable.

However, we see a countrywide uneven distribution of green energy. Moreover, it is mainly distributed in economically backward areas where transportation is inconvenient and underdeveloped. This has made development of Green Energy more difficult and expensive.

Current development of renewable energy in China

Analysis of the difficulties faced by Green Energy

1, Price

It is understandable that when the long-term usage of green energy plants and the cost of environment pollution caused by fuel-burning plant are included in the costs, green energy is currently not much more expensive than traditional energy. In western countries, fuel-burning plants have to pay an energy tax or ecological tax, which in addition cuts off the price difference between renewable and non-renewable. As the market for renewable energy becomes more and more mature, the costs of producing energy with renewable sources will keep declining. However, according to the current situation, green energy still needs the support of the government in terms of policy.

2, Distribution

As mentioned above, distribution of renewable energy in China is very uneven with more than 80-90% concentrating in poor areas with backward transportation and economy. Low demand for energy and little ability to pay for it greatly limits the possibility for the development of renewable energy in these areas, while there is not enough potential to exploit in the eastern part of the country where demand is high.

3, Mechanism

Under the current mechanism, eastern provinces are more willing to buy cheap electricity from the western provinces while leaving the expensive energy to local people. This makes the situation difficult: on the one hand, the whole country is thirsty for electricity; one the other hand, the more expensive green energy is left and wasted and brings no benefit to the poor local people.

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Partnership Initiatives (Back To Contents)

Institute of Environment & Development
IED/LEAD-China

VISION

Achieving sustainable development by promoting equity in dialogue & participation of all environmental stakeholders

MISSION

Empower public, especially disadvantaged groups, in search of solutions toward a sustainable society through capacity building, research and knowledge & information dissemination.

ORGANIZATOIN

IED/LEAD-China Core Faculty :

IED/LEAD-China Management Team :

ACTIVITY

IED/LEAD-China takes as a goal to empower all the environment stakeholders and general public, especially disadvantaged groups. We aim to create platform for free and equal dialogue, negotiation and participation in search of the path for the sustainable development. We are committed to the capacity building exercise through education, research, and information & knowledge dissemination applying information and communication technology (ICT).

Education emphasizes leadership development. It aims at bringing up a new generation of leaders with the vision of, the commitment to, and the ability of implementing sustainable development strategy. We believe that sustainable development would not be achieved without them who have the capacity of creatively meeting the challenges and resolving dilemmas or problems associated to the livelihoods of the human beings. Leadership development means building and enhancing such capacity through training and experiential learning of young potential leaders from different sectors of the society.

Research & Development focuses on developing new institutional arrangement at various levels, that integrates environment protection into development strategy and that encourages participation of all stakeholders, especially disadvantaged groups, in decision making and implementation process. Our experiment efforts aim at improving the governance of the society that is sensitive, inclusive, transparent and effective. We believe that sustainable development can only be achieved through institutional innovation in such a direction.

Information dissemination aims at enhancing the public access to environment information and knowledge. We believe that knowledge and information play a critical role in fundamentally changing attitudes of human beings toward the sustainability. IED/LEAD-China applies information and communication technology (ITC) as an effective tool to develop and disseminate information and knowledge to empower the public and support Chinese environment NGOs in their capacity building exercises.

CONTACT

Upcoming Conferences (Back To Contents)

* 2004 International Symposium on Water Resources Management and Development of Cities
* Regional Environmental Quality Change and Environmental Security in China
* 3 rd World Wind Energy Conference and Renewable Energy Exhibition Including Wind Power Asia 2004
* IWA International Conference on Water Conservation and Management in Coastal Areas
* Global Food Safety Forum

2004 International Symposium on Water Resources Management and Development of Cities

Regional Environmental Quality Change and Environmental Security in China

3 rd World Wind Energy Conference and Renewable Energy Exhibition Including Wind Power Asia 2004

IWA International Conference on Water Conservation and Management in Coastal Areas

Global Food Safety Forum

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