The rest of the world -- notably the United States, Japan and Western Europe -- must adjust to the emergence of China and India as industrializing, demanding and growing societies, a new report says.
And, in turn, China and India -- who have 40 percent of the global population -- must develop their economies without repeating the mistakes -?including huge pollution, labor abuses, and overexploitation of natural resources ?- that the developed nations made, the Worldwatch Institute study adds.
The State of the World 2006 paints an often-hopeful picture of how China and India are, in some instances, avoiding the problems that accompanied industrialization and development in First World nations.
But it also warns that the scale of demand as China and India strive, and rapidly succeed, in becoming developed nations will be enormous, due to the huge populations of the two nations: 1.297 billion now for China and 1.08 billion for India.
That enormous demand could in turn drive up worldwide demand for resources ranging from water to metals to concrete to oil, forcing adjustments in living standards -- downward -- in the world's developed nations, as competition for those products increases and they become increasingly expensive, the report says.
"The world is in the midst of a colossal shift, and China and India must find a new path forward ?- and so must the industrial countries," said Worldwatch President Christopher Flavin at a mid-January press conference. "If China and India were, per capita, to demand as much" in resources "as Japan does today, we would literally need another Planet Earth to meet that."
Such a situation would make the world "unstable," he added.
The report concentrated on the environmental and resource impact of the two nations. China, with annual growth rates of around 9 percent, now uses 26 percent of the world's oil and 47 percent of its cement. And it is a huge consumer of coal. India started out farther back, but its growth is expected to overtake China's, the study said.
While the report contained hopeful signs the two nations would not follow the path developed nations took towards their industrialization, it notes there are already problems. For example, China has become the leading producer of acid rain, due to an abundance of coal-fired power plants with few pollution controls, and 16 of the world's 20 most-polluted cities are in China, Worldwatch reports.
Questioned about whether China and India would take a different development path, or follow the pattern the industrialized nations set -- including their pattern on labor rights -- Flavin introduced some pessimism.
"There are multiple policies and directions in China and India" on such issues as use of resources, environmental regulation and conservation, he said. "But we don't argue that the preponderance of official thinking has changed" in China and India away from the development patterns the industrialized nations followed, he admitted.
"There is also tremendous pressure and incentive to continue on the traditional development path, expanding the use of coal and building more dams and so on. But China and India are much further along in their thinking" on how to deal with development "than the developed nations were at similar stages of their development."
When the United States, Britain, Japan and Europe were at the same industrializing stage China and India are undergoing -? from the mid-1800s through the early 1900s ?- issues of environmental impact, depleted resources and labor exploitation were generally ignored, Flavin explained.
The relatively more-advanced thinking in China and India "may help them avoid the mistakes the western industrialized world made," he added.
But the "First World" nations, including the United States, "will also have to reinvent" their economic and development patterns, Worldwatch warned. Otherwise, huge demand from China and India will force much-higher and unsustainable consumption, a huge rise in prices and increasing worldwide poverty, or all of those effects.
The developed economies must also change, the report adds, to take advantage of new and exportable technologies, thus keeping income coming in. Flavin said China and India are already doing so.
He gave new, compact, longer-lasting fluorescent light bulbs as an example: Though the technology was developed in the U.S. and Japan, China and India have such an abundance of engineering talent that they ?- not the western industrial nations ?- are developing the industry.
"China's private sector improved the technology and they now dominate the market," he said. "Now you can't find one, even here, that's not made in China.
"And if the Chinese produce and export effective solar energy systems for several hundred dollars each, not the several thousand they cost now, that'll make them more competitive" worldwide, he said.
Mark Gruenberg writes for Press Associates, Inc., news service. Used by permission.
For more information
To find out more about State of the World 2006 and order a copy of the report, go to www.worldwatch.org
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The rest of the world — notably the United States, Japan and Western Europe — must adjust to the emergence of China and India as industrializing, demanding and growing societies, a new report says.
And, in turn, China and India — who have 40 percent of the global population — must develop their economies without repeating the mistakes -?including huge pollution, labor abuses, and overexploitation of natural resources ?- that the developed nations made, the Worldwatch Institute study adds.
The State of the World 2006 paints an often-hopeful picture of how China and India are, in some instances, avoiding the problems that accompanied industrialization and development in First World nations.
But it also warns that the scale of demand as China and India strive, and rapidly succeed, in becoming developed nations will be enormous, due to the huge populations of the two nations: 1.297 billion now for China and 1.08 billion for India.
That enormous demand could in turn drive up worldwide demand for resources ranging from water to metals to concrete to oil, forcing adjustments in living standards — downward — in the world’s developed nations, as competition for those products increases and they become increasingly expensive, the report says.
“The world is in the midst of a colossal shift, and China and India must find a new path forward ?- and so must the industrial countries,” said Worldwatch President Christopher Flavin at a mid-January press conference. “If China and India were, per capita, to demand as much” in resources “as Japan does today, we would literally need another Planet Earth to meet that.”
Such a situation would make the world “unstable,” he added.
The report concentrated on the environmental and resource impact of the two nations. China, with annual growth rates of around 9 percent, now uses 26 percent of the world’s oil and 47 percent of its cement. And it is a huge consumer of coal. India started out farther back, but its growth is expected to overtake China’s, the study said.
While the report contained hopeful signs the two nations would not follow the path developed nations took towards their industrialization, it notes there are already problems. For example, China has become the leading producer of acid rain, due to an abundance of coal-fired power plants with few pollution controls, and 16 of the world’s 20 most-polluted cities are in China, Worldwatch reports.
Questioned about whether China and India would take a different development path, or follow the pattern the industrialized nations set — including their pattern on labor rights — Flavin introduced some pessimism.
“There are multiple policies and directions in China and India” on such issues as use of resources, environmental regulation and conservation, he said. “But we don’t argue that the preponderance of official thinking has changed” in China and India away from the development patterns the industrialized nations followed, he admitted.
“There is also tremendous pressure and incentive to continue on the traditional development path, expanding the use of coal and building more dams and so on. But China and India are much further along in their thinking” on how to deal with development “than the developed nations were at similar stages of their development.”
When the United States, Britain, Japan and Europe were at the same industrializing stage China and India are undergoing -? from the mid-1800s through the early 1900s ?- issues of environmental impact, depleted resources and labor exploitation were generally ignored, Flavin explained.
The relatively more-advanced thinking in China and India “may help them avoid the mistakes the western industrialized world made,” he added.
But the “First World” nations, including the United States, “will also have to reinvent” their economic and development patterns, Worldwatch warned. Otherwise, huge demand from China and India will force much-higher and unsustainable consumption, a huge rise in prices and increasing worldwide poverty, or all of those effects.
The developed economies must also change, the report adds, to take advantage of new and exportable technologies, thus keeping income coming in. Flavin said China and India are already doing so.
He gave new, compact, longer-lasting fluorescent light bulbs as an example: Though the technology was developed in the U.S. and Japan, China and India have such an abundance of engineering talent that they ?- not the western industrial nations ?- are developing the industry.
“China’s private sector improved the technology and they now dominate the market,” he said. “Now you can’t find one, even here, that’s not made in China.
“And if the Chinese produce and export effective solar energy systems for several hundred dollars each, not the several thousand they cost now, that’ll make them more competitive” worldwide, he said.
Mark Gruenberg writes for Press Associates, Inc., news service. Used by permission.
For more information
To find out more about State of the World 2006 and order a copy of the report, go to www.worldwatch.org