Asia Environmental Problems #20

Transcription

1 Asia Environmental Problems #20 -Describe the causes and effects of pollution on the Yangtze and Ganges Rivers. -Describe the causes and effects of air pollution and flooding in India and China.

2 Use the PowerPoint to get causes, effects and other information for the environmental issues that plague Asia. Nothing is highlighted or boldened meaning you need to READ through the information & decide what the causes, effects & extra important info may be for yourselves. Use headphones for the videos if you have them.

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4 Yangtze River- China

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6 Industrial chemicals have put the Yangtze River on the brink of catastrophe. Yangtze River

7 It is the third-longest in the world. The river s problems reflect the water crisis facing the world s most highly populated country.

8 China s people are already short of supplies because of prolonged drought in many regions and much of what remains has been contaminated by industrialization. About 40 percent of all waste water produced in China some 25 billion tons per year flows into the Yangtze river, but more than 80 percent of it is untreated beforehand.

9 Industrial waste and sewage, agricultural pollution and shipping discharges were to blame for the river s declining health, the experts said.

10 The river, the longest in the world after the Nile and the Amazon, runs from Qinghai and Tibet in the remote far west, through 186 booming cities, before emptying into the sea at Shanghai. For the futuristic city s 20 million residents, the death of the river could be critical. Lu Jianjian, a professor at Shanghai s East China Normal University, said: As the river is the only source of drinking water in Shanghai, it has been a great challenge for Shanghai to get clean water.

11 Environmentalists fear that unless local governments and industries become serious about cutting pollution, most of the water shipped north will not be fit to drink. Professor Lu said that contamination has reduced the number of species living in the Yangtze from 126 in the mid- 1980s, to 52 four years ago. The Yangtze dolphin may have already become the first cetacean to be made extinct by humans.

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13 Ganges River

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15 The Ganges River begins high in the Himalayas and flows southeast through India and Bangladesh for more than 1,500 miles to the Bay of Bengal. It is the most important river to the Indian subcontinent. The Ganges provides water for drinking, bathing, cooking, and for transportation for over 400 million people who live in its river valley. It runs through India s most fertile and densely populated areas. The Ganges is nicknamed Mother Ganges, and it is very sacred to the Hindu religion.

16 The Ganges river, also called "Mother Ganga" has been worshiped in India for more than 2000 years as the symbol of spiritual purity. And though spiritual purity has remained untouched for more than two centuries, her physical purity has deteriorated as this holy river suffers from severe pollution.

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19 Many people use the river for water & transportation. According to different scientific studies pollution is taking a heavy toll on Ganges river and 300 million gallons of waste go into the Ganges each day, causing terrible effects.

20 The amount of domestic sewage being dumped into the Ganges has more than doubled since the 1990's, and some studies suggest it could double again in a next generation. Scientists also found that portions of the river have a fecal bacteria count nearly 4,000 times the World Health Organization's standard for bathing and recent water samples collected revealed even worse results with a fecal bacteria count 10,000 times higher than the WHO standard for safe river bathing.

21 So what is the source of this tremendous pollution? Majority of Ganges pollution comes from organic waste such as sewage, trash, food, and human as well as animal remains

22 India's population boom hasn t been followed with appropriate waste-control infrastructure, and there hasn't been much effort on building new sewage systems & water treatment plants that should do more than just channel waste into the river like current sewage systems do.

23 Human and animal remains also pose serious environmental and health threats. The Hindu religion has a sacred practice of depositing human remains into the Ganges river, and since these remains are usually only partially cremated they pose not only environmental, but also serious health threats to the local population, especially when combined with the carcasses of thousands of dead cattle that are also dumped into the river each year.

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25 Industrial pollutants luckily account for much smaller proportion of pollution, and this is the good thing since the health and environmental impacts of toxic chemical waste can be far more threatening.

26 /photos/photos-of-the-dead-invaranasi-where-the-wealthy-arecremated-and-the-poor-are-leftto-the-vultures/

27 This level of pollution makes ideal ground for many water-borne diseases including cholera, hepatitis, typhoid and amoebic dysentery that are spreading among the 350 million who live along its shores or use its water. According to some estimations 80% of all health problems and one-third of deaths in India are result of different water-borne diseases.

28 In 1985 the Indian government launched plan to clean up the river, the so called "Ganges Action Plan". The original idea was to clean up the river in selected areas by installing sewage treatment plants and threatening fines and litigation against industries that pollute. This plan turned out to be one great failure since it tried to adapt a Western style solution to what is turned out to be non-adaptive region. Since then more than $ 300 million have been spent with very little to account for and even the federal environment minister said recently that $1.5 billion more was needed.

29 The government has so far made many promises but failed to deliver the right results. Perhaps the best reason for optimism could be the Supreme Court of India since lots of things get done judicially in India, and there are recent reports suggesting that legislators are starting to understand the importance of not discharging untreated human waste into the Ganges River which could be the first big step required for successful fight against pollution.

30 Ganges River This river also provides fertile soil for farming along the India Ganges River Valley.

31 3. China

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33 China s fast industrial development & the large population have created major problems for the environment. Pollution has increased & environmental resources have been depleted. 7 of the world s 10 most populous cities are located in China.

34 In 2008, when Beijing, China was awarded the Olympics, the city s air pollution became a big concern for many of the athletes.

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36 South Korea was quickly built up in the late 20th century. This brought increased pollution. Air & water were affected. Becoming industrialized happened quicker than the government could make policies to protect the environment.

37 25% of the people who live in South Korea, live in or around Seoul because of markets, jobs, and education that is not available in rural areas.

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39 India India s main environmental concern is overpopulation It affects many of India s other issues When rural populations increase, deforestation worsens. People use the trees for fuel: especially for cooking.

40 population-grows-to-7-billion?ft=3&f= &sc=nl&cc=es

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43 The map to the right shows just how many large countries it would take to equal the population of China.

44 China has 21 million more people than the 177 smallest countries on earth put together. Or to put it another way, only 33 countries are excluded from the map above. One of which is India:

45 Yet, you can also look at the population of China another way. India s population of billion people plus that of the Philippines million (12th largest) roughly equals China s billion people.

46 However, with population growing faster in India than China, the two countries are forecast to meet at roughly 1.4 billion each sometime before 2030, assuming of course current trends continue (they very well may not). me/2011/04/30/china-vs-indiathe-population-numbers/

47 Population of India compared to Africa, United Kingdom and South Korea combined As difficult as it may be to believe, India has more people than the continent of Africa (1.111 billion), United Kingdom (64.1 million) and South Korea (50.22 million) combined. The picture will look quite different by 2050, if current trends continue. At that point, Africa is projected to have 2.4 billion people, India 1.7 billion, United Kingdom 71 million and South Korea 43 million (which could increase if it reunifies with the north before then).

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49 India s climate is affected by seasonal winds called monsoons that drop almost 200 inches of rain every 6 months. zh_nfwm

50 Asia s Environmental Issues Air Pollution: Coal burning power plants in urban areas Cooking over wood or coal in rural areas Cooking & heating with biomass fuels Water Pollution: Yangtze: (China)- chemicals & factories Ganges: (India)- organic trash, sewage, remains used for water & transportation