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n the last day of April this year, Shanghai celebrated Below: Alleviating poverty remains the opening of the World Expo with fireworks, foun- one of China’s biggest challenges. tain displays and lasers that rivaled the launch of Top right: China is the world’s the Beijing Olympics in 2008. When the Expo ends third largest exporter of goods on October 31, around 70 million visitors will have seen what and services. China and other countries offer the world when it comes to Bottom right: For some people, creating sustainable solutions for a better life in modern cities. China’s economic development China’s development from an agricultural third world has resulted in a rapid increase country into an urbanized industrial economy – the world’s in wealth. third largest – is the most rapid transformation of a nation in history. Never before have so many people, within such a short timeframe, been lifted out of poverty. It’s a truly incredible turn of events, which former Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd referred to earlier this year during the 70th annual George E. Morrison Lecture at the Australian National University. “In 30 years, China has transformed itself into an increasingly global, wealthy, industrial and urban-centered economy,” he said. “Around 500 million people have been lifted out of poverty. This is unprecedented. We have all been beneficiaries of China’s remarkable performance.” There can be no argument that China is changing. Nearly half of its population now lives in urban centers, including around 150 cities that each number more than a million people. If current urbanization trends hold, consultancy firm McKinsey & Company has estimated that China’s urban population will expand from 572 million in 2005 to 926 million in 2025 and hit the one billion mark by 2030. In business terms, China’s urbanization promises sub- stark reality is that in a short period of time, China has become stantial new markets and investment opportunities. The coun- the world’s largest greenhouse gas emitter – it’s responsible try already has more internet users than the population of the for more than half the global increase in emissions. However, US and Canada combined. It also has more than a billion since it is the industrialized countries within the OECD that mobile phone users, while the largest operator, China Mobile, have created – and are still creating – most of the carbon dihas more subscribers than the number of citizens in all 27 oxide emissions, China is only part of the global greenhouse European Union nations. And following two decades of an- problem. “Another reason why the responsibility for this has nual growth averaging around the 10 percent mark, China is to be shared is that an increasing part of the Western world’s now the world’s largest exporter of manufactured goods and consumer goods are produced in China, with greenhouse gas the third largest exporter of goods and services. It is also the emissions as a consequence,” notes Karl Hallding, Head of world’s largest car market, having surpassed the US in 2009. the Stockholm Environment Institute’s China Cluster. So the recent worldwide financial crisis posed a major Water poses additional problems. Ill-planned hydrological threat. But while all other major economies struggled after engineering projects – which interrupt the natural flow of rivers being severely impacted, China invested in a massive stimu- – and conversion of wetlands for agriculture, along with ill-conlus program and became the principle engine of the global sidered construction and infrastructure projects in the flood economic recovery. As the world slid into recession in 2009, plains, have destroyed ecosystems. Decades of waste pourChina’s gross domestic product (GDP) grew 8.7 percent. De- ing from factories and cities into China’s rivers have turned velopment continues at full speed and numerous construction many of them into open sewers. According to the World Wildprojects are underway, with new buildings, bridges, railways life Fund, around 40 percent of the water in the country’s river and subway systems being built nationwide. In a few years, systems is unfit for human consumption. While southern ChiChina will have the most modern high-speed rail network in na is relatively well watered, the north – home to about half of the world; electric cars are slated to be in mass production; China’s population – is parched and now threatens to become big cities are aiming to be more sustainable and renewable the world’s biggest desert. As if that’s not enough cause for energy sources should be producing a major part of the coun- concern, respiratory and heart diseases related to air pollution try’s electricity. are the leading cause of death in China. But there is also another side to the economic miracle. The country’s polluted environment is largely a result of China’s rapid growth has come at the expense of the country’s its rapid development and the consequent increase in energy air, land and water. Much of it has already been degraded by consumption, which is primarily provided by coal-fired power decades of economic planning that emphasized the develop- plants. While some progress has been made in improving ment of heavy industry in urban areas. As Wang Jinnan, one energy efficiency and carbon dioxide emissions reduction, of China’s leading environmental researchers, told the New 75 percent of energy production is still dependent on coal. York Times: “There is pressure for change, but many people Building conventional coal-fired power plants is the fastest refuse to accept that we need a new approach so soon.” The way to increase electricity supply, but China realizes it has