Cure needed for plague of rural pollution

Every time I visit my hometown in the countryside, I am appalled at the amount of pollution I see. Colorful food packaging, plastic bags and batteries litter everywhere. I cannot help thinking how much damage this is doing to the countryside and to the entire country.

I am afraid to say that this sorry state of affairs is the rule rather than the exception, and preventive and remedial actions are urgently needed.

Pollution is an eyesore to say the least, which ruins the otherwise pristine countryside that some of us still remember. This is not just a cosmetic degradation, the countryside is sick with pollution. Unless restored back to health, the disease will spread through society.

It is not just a rural problem, it is a national crisis. Much of the pollution exists near farms where crops and vegetables grow, near rivers where fish swim (if the rivers are not already choked up with the garbage), and near land where cattle roam. Such pollution may end up in food chain and ultimately on the dining tables of those even in cities where people have to rely on food originally produced in the countryside.

Rural China is our common back yard. It may seem to be nobody's responsibility but it is everyone's problem. Food safety is often seen as a moral or regulatory problem, but it is also an environmental issue.

Rural pollution is not getting due attention. It's time that we cared enough about the issue to confront the problem, or we risk getting to the point of no return, when the land can no longer be restored to health.

If curbing such pollution appears on the government's radar, much can be done to improve the situation.

For instance, laws and regulations can be written, and more importantly, strictly enforced, to restrict the use of nonbiodegradable packaging and bags that contribute much to pollution in the countryside. Today, people in the countryside no longer just rely on produce from the land for survival. Rural consumers also consume industrially manufactured products through country stores and marketplaces.

Unlike cities, rural consumers do not have places to dump their garbage and littering ensues. Restricting plastic bags and similar polluting products will be a big step to treating the disease of rural pollution.

Another important action that has to be taken sooner or later - better sooner - is to build the necessary infrastructure for garbage collection and recycling. As rural areas become urbanized, authorities need to ensure that such infrastructure can cope with the garbage generated by residents. Without proper collecting, treatment and recycling infrastructure, a community will soon become surrounded by garbage.

In the United States, garbage trucks go into rural areas to collect waste on a weekly basis. This can be done in China as well. Building an effective garbage collection, treatment and recycling system will not only cure the sickness that plagues the land and improve food safety, it will also stimulate the economy, as dumpsters will be built, trucks purchased, and people hired, to clean up the environment. It will also create green businesses to professionally treat the collected garbage.

A cleaner countryside might also attract talent back to rural areas as jobs will be created and local economies will improve, which will be to everyone's benefit. Authorities at various levels should work on curbing pollution, and international organizations can help by providing ideas and best practices that may help deal with what is a colossal problem.

Changes created or mandated by government institutions cannot succeed without cooperation from rural residents. Many may fear that rural people are not educated enough to participate in creating a greener environment, that they will litter anyway, that they will not care enough to change their habits. I admit that it is not easy to change people's behavior, but I am optimistic enough to say that you may be surprised if you try. Rural residents' minds are not yet polluted beyond repair. Appeal to their reason, their love of their hometowns and their desire for a better future for their children. Fundamentally, who wouldn't want to live in a cleaner environment?

It is going to be a long and hard-fought battle, but one worth fighting, as it is good for our physical, psychological and spiritual well-being to have a better environment. It is not everyone's job to work on pollution control, but everyone can do something to improve the environment.

The author is a US-based instructional designer, literary translator and columnist writing on cross-cultural issues.

(China Daily 05/29/2013 page8)