Smil - Chinas past, Chinas future: energy, food, environment

China has a population of 1.3 billion people, which puts strain on her natural resources. This volume, by one of the leading scholars on the earths biosphere, is the result of a lifetime of study on China, and provides the fullest account yet of the environmental challenges that China faces.

The author examines Chinas energy resources, their uses, impacts and prospects, from the 1970s oil crisis to the present day, before analyzing the key question of how China can best produce enough food to feed its enormous population. In answering this question the entire food chain the environmental setting, post-harvest losses, food processing, access to food and actual nutritional requirements is examined, as well as the most effective methods of agricultural management. The final chapters focus upon the dramatic cost to the countrys environment caused by Chinas rapid industrialization. The widespread environmental problems discussed include:

• water and air pollution
• water shortage
• soil erosion
• deforestation
• desertification
• loss of biodiversity

In conclusion, Smil argues that the decline of the Chinese ecosystem and environmental pollution has cost China about 10 per cent of her annual GDP.

This book provides the best available synthesis on the environmental consequences of Chinas economic reform program, and will prove essential reading to scholars with an interest in China and the environment.

Vaclav Smil is Distinguished Professor in the Faculty of Environment, University of Manitoba, Canada. He is widely recognized as one of the worlds leading authorities on the biosphere and Chinas environment. He is the author of many books, including The Earths Biosphere, Enriching the Earth, Feeding the World and Chinas Environment.

Asias transformations

Edited by Mark Selden

Binghamton University and Cornell University, USA

The books in this series explore the political, social, economic and cultural consequences of Asias transformations in the twentieth and twenty-first centuries. The series emphasizes the tumultuous interplay of local, national, regional and global forces as Asia bids to become the hub of the world economy. While focusing on the contemporary, it also looks back to analyse the antecedents of Asias contested rise.

This series comprises several strands:

Asias transformations aims to address the needs of students and teachers, and the titles will be published in hardback and paperback. Titles include

The Battle for Asia

From Decolonization to Globalization

Mark T. Berger

Ethnicity in Asia

Edited by Colin Mackerras

Chinese Society, 2nd edition

Change, Conflict and Resistance

Edited by Elizabeth J. Perry and Mark Selden

The Resurgence of East Asia

500, 150 and 50 Year Perspectives

Edited by Giovanni Arrighi, Takeshi Hamashita and Mark Selden

The Making of Modern Korea

Adrian Buzo

Korean Society

Civil Society, Democracy and the State

Edited by Charles K. Armstrong

Remaking the Chinese State

Strategies, Society and Security

Edited by Chien-min Chao and

Bruce J. Dickson

Maos Children in the New China

Voices from the Red Guard

Generation

Yarong Jiang and David Ashley

Chinese Society

Change, Conflict and Resistance

Edited by Elizabeth J. Perry and Mark Selden

Opium, Empire and the Global Political Economy

Carl A. Trocki

Japans Comfort Women

Sexual Slavery and Prostitution during World War II and the US Occupation

Yuki Tanaka

Hong Kongs History

State and Society under Colonial Rule

Edited by Tak-Wing Ngo

Debating Human Rights

Critical Essays from the United States and Asia

Edited by Peter Van Ness

Asias great cities: Each volume aims to capture the heartbeat of the contemporary city from multiple perspectives emblematic of the authors own deep familiarity with the distinctive faces of the city, its history, society, culture, politics and economics, and its evolving position in national, regional and global frameworks. While most volumes emphasize urban developments since the Second World War, some pay close attention to the legacy of the longue dure in shaping the contemporary. Thematic and comparative volumes address such themes as urbanization, economic and financial linkages, architecture and space, wealth and power, gendered relationships, planning and anarchy, and ethnographies in national and regional perspective. Titles include

Hong Kong

Global City

Stephen Chiu and Tai-Lok Lui

Shanghai

Global City

Jeff Wasserstrom

Singapore

Carl Trocki

Beijing in the Modern World

David Strand and Madeline Yue Dong

Bangkok

Place, Practice and Representation

Marc Askew

Asia.com is a series which focuses on the ways in which new information and communication technologies are influencing politics, society and culture in Asia. Titles include

Asia.com

Asia Encounters the Internet

Edited by K. C. Ho, Randolph Kluver and Kenneth C. C. Yang

Japanese Cybercultures

Edited by Mark McLelland and Nanette Gottlieb

RoutledgeCurzon studies in Asias transformations is a forum for innovative new research intended for a high-level specialist readership, and the titles will be available in hardback only. Titles include

Chinese Media, Global Contexts

Edited by Chin-Chuan Lee

Imperialism in South East Asia

A Fleeting, Passing Phase

Internationalizing the Pacific

The United States, Japan and the Institute of Pacific Relations in War and Peace, 19191945

Tomoko Akami

Koreans in Japan

Critical Voices from the Margin

Edited by Sonia Ryang

The American Occupation of Japan and Okinawa

Literature and Memory

Michael Molasky

Critical Asian scholarship is a series intended to showcase the most important individual contributions to scholarship in Asian Studies. Each of the volumes presents a leading Asian scholar addressing themes that are central to his or her most significant and lasting contribution to Asian studies. The series is committed to the rich variety of research and writing on Asia, and is not restricted to any particular discipline, theoretical approach or geographical expertise.

Chinas Past, Chinas Future

Energy, Food, Environment

Vaclav Smil

China Unbound

Evolving Perspectives on the Chinese Past

Paul A. Cohen

Women and the Family in Chinese History

Patricia Buckley Ebrey

Southeast Asia

A Testament

George McT. Kahin