Day 2 Report from Nanjing – NGOs Dive Into Water Work
Posted by Wen Bo
On the first night during the conference I saw a CCTV- 2 documentary film on water pollution in China. When I turned it on, it was presenting on Lake Tai pollution. Then the program reported more about a series of other toxic pollution problems. Ma Jun, founder and director of Institute for Public and Environmental Affairs (IPE), was interviewed as well as a retired director of Yangtze River Water Resources Management Bureau. The retired official stated that each year the amount of polluted water carried into the Yangtze is nearly the amount of the entire amount the Yellow River itself.
Ma Jun showed up on the morning of the second day of the conference and was the first one to present. Unfortunately all the governmental officials, provincial and local, had all left the conference the previous day.
Those who remained at the conference were green groups, Japanese participants, American delegates, a couple of environmental technology companies, Nanjing University students, the local organizers, and a few representatives from here and there. There were around 70 people in attendance.
I called Li Chunhua of Green Stone (www.green-stone.org) in Nanjing and invited her to a meeting that she wasn’t aware of. The supervisor (official legal person) of Green Stone Ning Ming called me later and told me that he happened to be in Nanjing and wanted to meet. He is normally based in Turkey, working for a Chinese company. I told him that I would like to visit Green Stone in the evening. Zhou Xiang of Green Anhui (www.green-anhui.org) and Ran Liping of Green Camel Bell (http://www.gcb.ngo.cn) would come to visit their office as well.
The first session on day two of the conference focused on involving businesses in water pollution solutions. Ma Jun gave a good presentation on the Water Pollution Map and IPE’s Green Choice program. Laura Ediger of Business for Social Responsibility (BSR) talked about their program working with companies and promoted Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR). Noriko Sakamoto of Japan for Sustainability (www.japanfs.org) presented their organizational structure and activities.
During the Q&A session, most questions were raised by Americans and directed to Ma Jun. Matt Turner of Future 500 and the National Wildlife Federation commented and congratulated on Ma Jun’s great work, and indicated that Americans can learn a lot from his work.
I also raised questions, one to Noriko and one to Ma Jun. I thanked the organizer for inviting Japanese environmental NGOs to this conference as it is quite rare for Chinese green groups to interact with their Japanese counterparts. My question was
“What are the challenges for grassroots environmental NGOs in Japan?” According to Noriko, Japanese groups have been mostly focused in local issues and do not work much internationally. And one serious barrier is the lack of English language skills.
My question directed to Ma Jun was about his work and IPE (http://en.ipe.org.cn), and respective challenges the organization faces. Ma Jun said, when asked about such a question to a Chinese NGO, that they would normally answer that funding is the biggest challenge. Ma Jun felt the biggest challenge is lack of talented and skilled personnel. He said all the work they do and other NGOs do require experienced and talented staff to carry out.
The second session of the morning was titled “NGOs Dive into Water Work”. I was the first one to present and give remarks on my observation of China’s environmental status and crisis and an overall picture of Pacific Environment’s water pollution work and network in China. My talk was followed by Zhou Xiang of Green Anhui (http://www.green-anhui.org) and Eve Li of Green Oasis (www.greensocc.org). Both of them gave a detailed and vivid presentation on their water programs. Eve Li talked a bit more on other Green Oasis’ work in Shanghai. Greenpeace Toxic campaigner Wu Yixiu gave the last presentation and introduced 2009 Greenpeace water/toxic programs and what on their wish-list in 2010, as well as Greenpeace in general.
During the Q&A session, Jun Bi of Nanjing University, who is also the local organizer of this conference, pointed out that NGOs sometimes are not scientific and need to provide more scientific and accurate research data. His impression was that NGOs do not seem very professional and that government and others will not take NGOs seriously to if there is no sound scientific research or data.
There was another participant from Tongjin University of Shanghai with an environmental engineer background who made a similar comment. Eve Li answered that they have been trying to seek support from researchers and try to be as scientific-based as possible.
When the second, yet similar, comment was made, I responded that one should not differentiate NGOs from their own sectors. NGOs could have members or board members from science or research backgrounds. I also urged that they, as researchers, should support NGOs and communicate their results with media, with NGOs and the public. Finally, I reiterated that NGOs are also learning and are trying to be as accurate and professional and are actively seeking to gain environmental expertise.
In the afternoon session, Wang Jingjing of IPE, Ran Liping of Green Camel Bell (www.gcb.ngo.cn) and Wang Zhijun of Jiangsu Friends of Green (www.jshj.org) presented their work. Ran Liping made the opening remarks in English.
In the Q&A session, questions came from several angles. Matt Turner of Future 500 specifically wanted to know how many staff member each of the above groups had. The answers were: Friends of Green has 9, IPE has 6 and Green Camel Bell has 3.
At the end, I made a comment to encourage and thank Ran Liping’s work and her passion to work in Gansu which is an economically backward region.
Jennifer Turner, Director of China Environmental Project at Woodrow Wilson Center for Scholars, asked if there were any groups working around Lake Tai. The Jiangsu Friends of Green introduced some Nanjing based groups and Ran Liping introduced Green Stone in the audience. Eve Li stood up and explained why green groups are absent in this region. She took Shanghai as an example, stating that the NGO salary could not afford high housing price in Shanghai and that there has been a tradition for people coming from Zhejiang and Jiangsu provinces to work in business instead. And, that there is family pressure from parents for their children to choose a proper job which would be regarded as family honor.
The next moderated discussion will be next steps for Lake Tai.
Tags: China, Water Pollution
