Jianguo (Jack) Liu evaluates tourist traffic at a roadside stop in the popular Woolong Nature Reserve in the Sichuan Province of China. (Hi-res jpg)

In the cover-story feature article, Liu and Diamond outline the striking changes to China's environment, including:

• Much of China 's rapidly growing economy, coal mining and cement, paper, and chemical production, still rests on outdated, inefficient, or polluting technology. Industrial energy efficiency overall is much lower than that of the developed nations.

• Almost all coastal seas are polluted.

• Freshwater fisheries are being severely degraded by pollution and overfishing.

• Environmental damage has caused severe economic losses, social conflicts and human health dangers.

• Lifestyle changes have meant that the number of China 's households
  grew almost three times as fast as its population during 1985-2000 because average household size declined dramatically. Reduction in
  household size alone led to 80 million more households in China from 1985-2000, an increase exceeding the total number of households in Russia and Canada. Smaller households use resources less efficiently.

“China's environmental problems also spill over to other countries, which are increasingly affected through sharing the same planet, atmosphere, and oceans with China,” Liu and Diamond note. “In turn, other countries affect China's environment through globalization as well as through their own environmental pollution and resource exploitation.”

Liu and Diamond itemize a litany of push and pull between China and the rest of the world. The hallmark is environmental damage which places economic, social and health burdens with which China is ill-equipped to cope.

The developed nations, Liu and Diamond argue, carry a strong moral obligation to lead in helping the developing nations protect the environment and achieve economic sustainability. In the developed nations, the big picture is easier to see on a full stomach. Protections – such as laws, zoning rules and regulations – are possible thanks to the luxury of economic power. The developing nations' first priority on the most basic needs makes bigger-picture concerns harder to address.

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