Environment     

Environment at risk from rapidly rising population

Shanghai Daily, January 14, 2014

• Shanghai's rapidly increasing population is a major challenge for the city's environment and may be too much for it to bear, a government report said yesterday.

  Commuters wait for trains at a subway station during peak hours in Shanghai. [File photo]

  Urbanization has resulted in problems such as inadequate land resources and air pollution in a city that already has 24 million permanent residents, according to the 2008-2012 Shanghai Natural Resources and Ecological Environment Statistics report.

  Investment in environmental protection, however, has been lagging far behind economic development.

  "Though the environmental protection fund has increased by 8 percent annually, its percentage of the city's GDP has been falling," the Shanghai Statistics Bureau said in the report.

  Environmental protection investment accounted for 2.8 percent of the city's total output value in 2012, compared with 3 percent in 2008, the report said. It urged the city government to increase investment to curb environmental pollution since the city had paid a great price for its economic expansion.

  Residents' satisfaction with their environment decreased by 4.7 percent in 2012 compared with that in previous years, the report said.

  "Local residents have been suffering great disappointment after finding the environment failed to be improved after the city's hosting of the World Expo 2010," the report said.

  The event was expected to greatly improve the city's environment and infrastructure with its theme of "Better City, Better Life."

   

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