Rating B (Moderate Progress)China’s agricultural landscape is as diverse as one can imagine: Lush mango plantations and pineapple fields stretch across Hainan Island. Shimmering rice terraces dominate the landscapes of Guangxi and Yunnan in the South, fields of wheat those in Sichuan – China’s “breadbasket” in the Southwest – and Henan in the center. Water-filled...
Rating: BPast discussions on the water in China have centred mainly on the use of water for hydroelectricity generation and the construction of megadams, e.g., the Three Gorges Dam, as well as the remediation of drinking water pollution due to leachate from agricultural activity and wastewater contamination from industrial production. Over the past five years,...
China Progress Report: Midway 2023 Rating: CChina’s decarbonization efforts stagnate as the country must balance between economic recovery, energy security, and meeting the 30/60 carbon targets.Greenhouse Gas or CO2 emissions-related data for the first half of 2023 appears unavailable via official sources such as the National Bureau of Statistics. The NBS usually publishes aggregated information,...
China’s legal institutions have increasingly had to deal with cases related to environmental issues over the past decade. In 2020 alone, Chinese prosecutors had to handle some 80,000 environmental public interest cases. Early environmental law first governed air and water pollution, industrial discharge, or agricultural soil contamination. Issues related to climate change have started to...
The latest installment of the IPCC’s Assessment Report AR6 stipulates that countries will have to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 50% over 1990 temperatures by 2030. Will China, the world’s largest greenhouse gas emitter, achieve this goal?While there is no crystal ball to fully predict the future of China’s emissions, the latest IPCC report has...
According to an IMF working paper on fossil fuel subsidies, East Asia and the Pacific region account for 48% of global energy subsidies. By country, China has been the biggest subsidizer in absolute terms, contributing 2.2 trillion USD in subsidies in 2020, or nearly 15% of GDP and approx. 1,600 USD per capita. However, different...
The People’s Republic of China does not recognize the term “indigenous people” for its 55 ethnic minorities (incl. groups in Taiwan), even though in 1990 the country declared itself a supporter of indigenous rights elsewhere. Instead, China calls its various ethnic groups “ethnic minorities” (少数民族). The difference in terminology can be explained in historic terms....
For millennia, China has been a rural, agriculture-based country. While 56.1% or 5.29 mio km2 (2020) of China’s landmass is still considered agricultural land, the importance of agriculture for the country’s development has been steadily decreasing over the past decades. There are currently about 3.9 mio km2 of pasture and between 1.3. – 1.6 mio...
The State Grid Corporation and the China Southern Power Grid Corporation China today operates on two wide area synchronous grids: the State Grid in the North and China Southern Power Grid in the South. The grids are operated by two respectively named grid operating companies. China’s electric power industry started at the end of...
Electrification of China’s transport system, industry, heating, and other sectors is the backbone of the country’s drive to decarbonize its development. Therefore, it is important to take a look at the development of the sources of electricity: thermal combustion for power and the simultaneous growth of output and use of renewable energy sources like wind...
