A Chinese Saying in Smog!

Beijing’s critical air quality unmasks the darker side of urbanization



The Chinese New Year – being celebrated as the year of the water snake – that was unveiled in China this year presented a rare insight of the dragon. Far from celebrating the festivities, residents of Beijing were forced to stay indoors. Schools were shut down; commercial and even essential business came to a halt. And the reason: a thick blanket of black and noxious smoke that enveloped most of the skyline of China’s capital. The smog plunged Beijing’s 20 million people into darkness for most of the days in January this year. One of the world’s top cities, Beijing, was blanketed in a thick foul-smelling layer of hazardous smog, which experts are now calling the worst air pollution disaster in China’s history. For the first time, even the Chinese government admitted that Beijing’s air was “hazardous”, and agreed with US and independent scientists about the increasing poisonous air in Beijing. As the world takes note of China’s amazing growth, the Beijing smog may have only showcased the ugly side of an increasing urban landscape in China, but revealed the darker side of increasing urbanization.

Festivities had to wait. The air smelt foul. The suffocation caused by the smog was apparent. “How do we get out of this suffocating siege of pollution?” screamed the People’s Daily, the official Communist party newspaper in an editorial. The Chinese State seemed helpless. A weather-induced curfew-like situation prevailed in most of Beijing’s streets. Hospital admissions in the city showed a 30 per cent increase, especially for respiratory illness, congestion and asthma. And when Chinese state pollution agencies admitted that air pollution levels were above the permissible limit, they were only stating the obvious.

It is well-known that air pollution standards in China are one of the worst in the world. For instance, Suspended Particulate Matter (SPM) levels of 2.5 were above 600 micrograms in Beijing in January, when the safe level designated by the World Health Organization is 25. In the US, no more than 12 micrograms is considered safe. But SPM levels in Beijing jumped to more than 900 micrograms on many peak smog days. These significant figures have alarmed scientists around the world, as they are accompanied by catastrophic public health events.

Changing times

The Chinese may well be living in interesting times, but the Beijing smog is not an isolated event. Pollution events and weather-related events are affecting everyday life in every city around the world. In Delhi, for example, a thick fog affected daily life recently, forcing schools, airports and railways to suspend work. The change in the weather pattern in Delhi is telling – for instance, winters now begin only in late December, a far cry from the 1980s and 1990s, when jackets and blankets were pulled out in November itself. On many smog days, SPM levels in Delhi were at 400, way above permissible limits. Experts admit winters in Delhi are more chilling and take away many lives of the homeless each year. In contrast, you will find almost every resident wearing a pollution mask in Beijing on peak pollution days, indicating greater awareness among common people and proper monitoring of air quality. The stench of a polluted urbanized landscape has spread across the world. In 2012, Tehran reported 4,400 deaths annually due to air pollution. In shocking cases reported in the media, many hospitals ran out of essential hospital equipments to handle the number of patients afflicted with pollution related sickness and emergencies. Delhi hospitals record an increase in the number of patients with asthma and eye infections during winter months.

Un-masking pollution

In many cities across the world, pollution levels are not even monitored or data analyzed, revealing poor awareness among local populace and exposing information gaps about individual and community health in public health systems. Governments and authorities in many countries are working towards strengthening environment protection. But in many cases, authorities are only beginning to take evasive action against air pollution like pollution masks, and not pre-emptive steps like green infrastructure, incentives and long-term city planning policies. Blanket solutions to curb air pollution may be hard to find. In China, the smog was largely blamed on pollution emanating from local industries, even though the country boasts of eco-friendly policies like cycling tracks, efficient public transport and mandatory pollution masks. Delhi has a cleaner fuel, CNG, but it also has more vehicles on its streets than ever before. Experts believe even tighter European pollution standards both diesel and petrol vehicles may not be able to reverse the worsening air quality trends for the capital. Cities today need more and tighter standards for emissions, not less. They need better and efficient public transport systems, not cheaper cars. They need proper city planning that gives space and incentives for green innovations and cleaner mobility. If we cannot come up with an ecological blueprint, cities like Beijing, Delhi or Tehran, will become a nightmare not just to live, but simply to breathe…