Opposition and resistance: Governance challenges around urban growth in China and the UK

This paper proposes that, different though they are, the processes of urban development in China and the UK can be analytically compared by looking at the commonly occurring opposition and resistance to that development. Such opposition and resistance can delay and limit the development of land in and immediately surrounding cities. The paper firstly reviews literature on opposition and resistance to development in both the UK and China, before going on to suggest that this opposition and resistance can in part be explained by a common cause – resentment at opaque and top-down/centralised planning processes. Consequently, the paper concludes that a common solution may applicable in both contexts – increasing participation and building institutional/civic capital amongst communities – and considers the likelihood of implementing this solution, particularly in China

Strategies to reduce nutrient pollution from manure management in China

As the demand for livestock products continues to increase in China, so too does the challenge of managing increasing quantities of manure. Urgent action is needed to control point source (housing, storage and processing) and diffuse (field application) pollution and improve the utilization of manure nutrients and organic matter. Here, we review strategies to improve management at each stage of the manure management chain and at different scales. Many strategies require infrastructure investment, e.g., for containment of all manure fractions. Engineering solutions are needed to develop advanced composting systems with lower environmental footprints and design more efficient nutrient stripping technologies. At the field-scale, there is an urgent need to develop a manure nutrient recommendation system that accounts for the range of manure types, cropping systems, soils and climates throughout China. At the regional scale, coordinated planning is necessary to promote recoupling of livestock and cropping systems, and reduce nutrient accumulation in regions with little available landbank, while minimizing the risk of pollution swapping from one region to another. A range of stakeholders are needed to support the step change and innovation required to improve manure management, reduce reliance on inorganic fertilizers, and generate new business opportunities

Optimization on emergency materials dispatching considering the characteristics of integrated emergency response for large-scale marine oil spills

Many governments have been strengthening the construction of hardware facilities and equipment to prevent and control marine oil spills. However, in order to deal with large-scale marine oil spills more efficiently, emergency materials dispatching algorithm still needs further optimization. The present study presents a methodology for emergency materials dispatching optimization based on four steps, combined with the construction of Chinese oil spill response capacity. First, the present emergency response procedure for large-scale marine oil spills should be analyzed. Second, in accordance with different grade accidents, the demands of all kinds of emergency materials are replaced by an equivalent volume that can unify the units. Third, constraint conditions of the emergency materials dispatching optimization model should be presented, and the objective function of the model should be postulated with the purpose of minimizing the largest sailing time of all oil spill emergency disposal vessels, and the difference in sailing time among vessels that belong to the same emergency materials collection and distribution point. Finally, the present study applies a toolbox and optimization solver to optimize the emergency materials dispatching problem. A calculation example is presented, highlighting the sensibility of the results at different grades of oil spills. The present research would be helpful for emergency managers in tackling an efficient materials dispatching scheme, while considering the integrated emergency response procedure.Peer ReviewedPostprint (published version

Sovereignty, intervention, and social order in revolutionary times

This article has been accepted for publication and will appear in a revised form, subsequent to peer review and/or editorial input by Cambridge University Press, in Review of International Studies / Volume 39 / Issue 05 / December 2013, pp 1149 - 1167 Copyright © British International Studies Association 2013 DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/S026021051300025

Urbanisation and health in China.

China has seen the largest human migration in history, and the country's rapid urbanisation has important consequences for public health. A provincial analysis of its urbanisation trends shows shifting and accelerating rural-to-urban migration across the country and accompanying rapid increases in city size and population. The growing disease burden in urban areas attributable to nutrition and lifestyle choices is a major public health challenge, as are troubling disparities in health-care access, vaccination coverage, and accidents and injuries in China's rural-to-urban migrant population. Urban environmental quality, including air and water pollution, contributes to disease both in urban and in rural areas, and traffic-related accidents pose a major public health threat as the country becomes increasingly motorised. To address the health challenges and maximise the benefits that accompany this rapid urbanisation, innovative health policies focused on the needs of migrants and research that could close knowledge gaps on urban population exposures are needed

China, the United States, and the Climate Change Challenge

Outlines China's climate change policy, U.S. concerns about transfer of carbon-intensive jobs to China and ways to address them, ways for U.S. policy and legislation to spur China's adoption of clean technologies, and specific mechanisms for cooperation

What if Beijing had enforced the 1st or 2nd greenbelt? – Analyses from an economic perspective

Many fast growing cities have designated greenbelts but have failed to maintain them. This is often attributed to weak planning regulations, but there is little understanding of the underlying impacts of greenbelts on the interactions among land use control, transport supply and economic activities. This paper presents a counterfactual analytical model to examine the greenbelts’ impacts on consumers’ utility, producers’ productivity, and their locational choices. The model establishes historic-what-if scenarios and compares what historically happened with what could have happened under alternative levels of greenbelt interventions. The model is applied to Beijing, which intended to establish two greenbelts in 1994, but large parts of the greenbelts have disappeared under fast urban expansion. The model compares the economic impacts of the greenbelts as they stood with hypothetical fully-enforced greenbelts and no-greenbelt scenarios from 1990 to 2010. The modelling results show that the two greenbelts, if fully enforced, would have decreased consumer surplus by $202 million in Beijing in 2010. To fulfil the policy aim of decentralisation, transport improvements between the city and new towns are crucial. For a more effective implementation of greenbelts in the future, development constraints could be carefully removed from non-ecologically sensitive sites which are served with good transport conditions.Cambridge Overseas Trust China Scholarship Council special fund of Key Laboratory of Eco Planning & Green Building, Ministry of Education (Tsinghua University), China Capco Future Cities Fellowship, Cambridge Real Estate Research Centre The Cambridge-UC Berkeley-National University of Singapore University Alliance project ’Smart Design