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UPDATED: January 10, 2007 NO. 3 JANUARY 18, 2007
Eco Warrior Faces Up
China's new Green Man is outing industrial polluters and logging every polluted river in the country. Along the way he's making people take ownership of their environment
By LI LI
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To ensure the reliability of the map, the figures come mostly from government agencies such as environmental protection agencies, water resources agencies, and land and resources agencies; the remaining come from mainstream media news reports. Ma once doubted public enthusiasm for a map of this kind, but his fears were quickly allayed after nearly 100 website visitors across the country wrote to offer geographical adjustments to rivers in their hometowns on the map, in the first week of its operation.

"By presenting figures in a clear and comprehensive way, people can feel more direct and real about pollution around them," said Wang Yongchen, founding director of Beijing-based environmental NGO Green Earth Volunteers. Her organization has helped to provide GPS positioning for the 20-odd offending factories and industrial parks in Beijing on Ma Jun's map.

Ma said a major goal of his website is to encourage public participation in environmental affairs, which is in line with government strategies. In Ma's recent article titled A Path to Environmental Harmony, he wrote about the emergence of an "orderly participation" governance model, which was advocated in a proposal on building harmonious socialist society adopted by the Central Committee of the Chinese Communist Party in October 2006. The same document calls for "expansion at all levels of citizenry" orderly participation in politics, ensuring the people's legal management of national affairs, the economy, culture and social affairs.

Ma said the legal foundation for public participation in environmental affairs was laid down by the 2003 Environmental Assessment Law stipulating "the state encourages organizations, experts and the public to participate in appropriate ways in environmental impact assessments." The State Environmental Protection Administration publicized Provisional Guidelines on Public Participation in Environmental Impact Assessments in February 2006, which put forth detailed requirements on information disclosure for project builders.

Won't back down

Ma said the inspiration of launching this website derives partly from his working experience as a consultant at Sinosphere Corp., which specializes in environmental management consultancy for multinationals operating in China. When a client said it would be very useful to have a search engine to screen Chinese companies with bad environmental records and remove them from the company's supply chain, Ma knew he had started to make a difference. But he also felt disturbed.

"This request stimulated me to reflect on why our workers exposed to a toxic working environment could be saved only when pressure travels across the Pacific Ocean from a multinational headquartered in the United States," he said.

The experience exposed a clearer line of action that he committed himself to exploring. First, economic incentives could be a useful tool to motivate companies to comply with environmental regulations. In the future, Ma plans to install a search engine on his website to screen companies as his old client suggested. Second, Chinese people should take the initiative to save their own environment.

However, Ma's surprising finding in his surveys for compiling his online map, is that 33 multinational companies--up to mid-October--have been on Ma's list of companies of bad records. Five of the 33 companies are global Fortune 500 companies. "They have repeatedly stressed their commitment to environmental protection and good corporate citizenship to Chinese consumers. It is regrettable that they even failed to meet the environmental standards of the local government even if they have the capacity, capital and techniques to do so," said Ma. Several of these companies have tried to persuade Ma to pull their names off the list under the pressure from their parent company, but he has rejected all such requests. "I want them to respond in a positive way by doing practical work to solve their problems, rather than compete by lowering their environmental standards," he said.

Despite the many challenges, Ma is generally optimistic about environmental protection work in China. He said that the Chinese Government has paid increasingly more attention to environmental protection in the last two decades. This can be seen by the step-up of its national strategies from sustainable development, to scientific development concept and to harmony between nature and mankind. However, Ma pointed out that China's environment is still on a deterioration curve due to its massive industrialization and urbanization. "Our efforts could rarely pay off 'old debts' while 'new debts' are added every day," said Ma, referring to irreversible damage already done in the past. For this gatekeeper there is no going back. "Under such circumstances, we need extra efforts in order to bounce back from the pit we have dug for ourselves." 

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