The Destruction of Urbanization
Countries that are able to harness and utilize technology and its advancement have had a large amounts of economic growth. Technology has lead the world to become a flatter place because of globalization. Globalization has help boost income per capita in rural countries, and many agricultural based nations want to become urbanized, so they too could utilize technology to globalize their economy. Those who make the decision to become urbanize are the elite officials. They do not see the harmful and lasting affects that urbanization could do to their country.
For example China was once a vast land of open nature, but now its an urbanize nation that filled with pollution and contaminates. Their water is contaminated with high concentration of mercury, and their air is filled with smoke clouds from fuel burning power plants. There are no laws or regulations to stop these industries from polluting the land. There is overfishing and over usage of non renewable resources which harms the locals. Health conditions are rapidly decreasing because of the harmful living conditions. People are malnourished because there is not enough food to eat. Chinese children are are becoming weaker, because they are breathing in the harmful air and drinking the contaminated water. Fertility rates have been declining, because women are not being properly nourish. The Chinese government traded the health of its people and the beauty of its environment for an increase in economic growth.
The government is now trying to implement environmental regulations, so they could have a more sustainable life for its people . Those who have to cut back on their pollutants are not the industries, but the people who live in the slums. They are the ones that are suffering from the pollutants and the lack of resource and now they are the ones that have to clean it up. China is now one of the top three leading competitors in the global market, but it has lost the beauty of its land and the health of its people. Urbanization leads to growth for the economy, and also leads to the destruction of the people.
References
Barrett, John & Guan, Dabo & Hubecek, Klaus & Wiedmann, Thomas (2009) Environmental Implications of Urbanization and Lifestyle Change in China: Ecological and Water Footprints, Business Source Complete, Retrieved Oct 28, 2009 http://web.ebscohost.com.libaccess.sjlibrary.org/bsi/detail?vid=7&hid=106&sid=38b2d8e8-276e-4c62-ae3c-d58c83a16dcf%40sessionmgr10&bdata=JnNpdGU9YnNpLWxpdmU%3d#db=bth&AN=43002907
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China is not the only country that experienced this problem. Any country that goes through the similar process of urbanization will also find themselves having the same experience, for example, Mexico City, Los Angeles, London, Ranipet-India, La Oroya-Peru, and many more.
ReplyDeleteUrban city provides many advantages such as job, entertainment (night life), and diversity. However, urban city also depletes its own resources as well as its neighbor, such as water and oil. Not only that, it also pollutes its own environment. In a way, it is similar to eating and pooping in your own home without doing anything to clean up the mess.
The government as well as the people should be more aware of this situation and taking care of their surroundings. There is no point of ignoring the problem. I think we should start taking action before it is too late, for example, teaching younger children to be more aware of their environment and what they do can cause consequences. Don't let this problem becomes like global warming, where our ex-president denied the actual danger and let his people think that the situation is okay.
I have lived in two major cities: New York and San Jose. Even though population in each have increased significantly over the past 30 years, San Jose's air is getting dirtier and New York's is getting cleaner.
ReplyDeleteIt would be interesting to investigate the rate of incidence of infant respiratory distress and childhood ear infections.
This is interesting because china has become a leading global competitor but at what cost. It is sad when government and big businesses are more concerned with making money then they are with protecting the citizens for whom they are suppose to watch out for. It is good to hear that steps are being taken to regulate unethical business operations. This remids me of what we spoke about in class today, globalization and commodity fetishism, could this be one of the forces that pushed china to become this way?
ReplyDeleteIt is unfortunate that developing and booming countries like China and India are pumping hundreds of tons of garbage into the air EVERY DAY. What's more unfortunate is until a more efficient method of energy consumption is available, coal fired power plants in these developing countries are the cheapest way to go. We here in America still use coal fired plants, as evidenced by the great rust belt back east. Sorry folks, but since coal is extremely abundant, humans are gonna be burning it for a very very long time.
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