(02-03-2016, 01:58 AM)pid=\6920 Wrote:Quality of life might be improving in China, but it's at the cost of pollution, tainted groundwater, massive agricultural land depleted of nutrients and damaged with salts, lack of personal freedom and eradication of family-hood and tradition.
More on this part - it's not just China but the rest of the world:
Quote:Salinization is reducing the world's irrigated area by 1-2 percent every year, hitting hardest in the arid and semi-arid regions.
Quote:Irrigation produces much of the world's food, but about a tenth of the world's irrigated land has been damaged by salt. This has become a profound threat to food security.
http://www.fao.org/worldfoodsummit/engli...focus1.htm
It is really affecting both China and India. Russia and the Asian ex-Soviet nations are hit the hardest by this. I saw a detailed map showing the changes but it was in a recent National Geographic magazine from last year.
Deforestation is causing accelerated desertification of lands due to less moisture retention and greater water run-away, plus erosion. Plus the quality of water used for irrigation is sometimes hazardous to the lands as the water is not properly desalinated from the source (like Aral Sea, which just exacerbated as it started drying up), and thus the salt just builds up in the soil.
What affects these areas affect the rest of the world. If China alone is turned into vast wastelands, the rest of the world suffer accordingly. The rivers and groundwater run-off from China are polluting the seas, killing off marine life. Air pollution is affecting other countries, while China dams up all of the major rivers that feed Vietnam, Laos, Thailand, Burma, Cambodia - stealing the natural water supply. What should be dumped into controlled landfills and containers is being dumped out by cargo ships into the ocean, reaching shores across the world and affecting birds all over. 3rd-world countries might have less resources to control their pollution, but China the most of all, is knowingly screwing a good deal of the world over - trying to make deals with logging businesses in Brazil to wipe out the Amazon forest for starters.
Initial prosperity of global capitalization with cheap Chinese franchise = instant gratification for the rich American, but the grandchildren of the rich and especially grandchildren's children will suffer as a result.
Edit-
Quote:According to a study by UN University, about 62 million hectares (20%) of the world's irrigated lands are affected, up from 45 million hectares in the early 1990s.[url=https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soil_salinity_control#cite_note-physorg102014-1][/url]
Also affecting California (San Joaquin valley), Colorado river basin, Australia.