{"id":1898,"date":"2016-06-01T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2016-06-01T08:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/master.k8s.p4.greenpeace.org\/eastasia\/aboutus\/1898\/china-releases-its-first-ever-soil-pollution-prevention-plan-greenpeace-response\/"},"modified":"2019-11-23T21:34:37","modified_gmt":"2019-11-24T05:34:37","slug":"china-releases-its-first-ever-soil-pollution-prevention-plan-greenpeace-response","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.greenpeace.org\/eastasia\/press\/1898\/china-releases-its-first-ever-soil-pollution-prevention-plan-greenpeace-response\/","title":{"rendered":"China releases its first ever soil pollution prevention plan, Greenpeace response"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p><strong>Beijing, 31 May, 2016 \u2013 China\u2019s State Council today released the Soil Pollution Prevention Action Plan, China\u2019s first ever policy plan aimed at tackling the country\u2019s prevalent soil pollution problem. The document aims to ensure that 90% of currently polluted farmland is usable by 2020. Greenpeace East Asia urges the government to strengthen the plan by complementing it with legal measures and reforming the country\u2019s polluting agricultural system.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n<p>\u201cA policy to tackle China\u2019s endemic soil pollution has been desperately overdue for years now. In terms of its ambition, comprehensiveness and its promise to regularly disclose data to the public, the Soil Pollution Prevention Action Plan is a welcome first step,\u201d said Ada Kong Greenpeace East Asia toxics manager.<\/p>\n\n<p>As more and more heavy industries move from eastern to central and western China, it is vital to combat the potential correlative spread of soil pollution.<\/p>\n\n<p>\u201cThe action plan must be given the teeth to truly combat soil pollution. Greenpeace urge the government to complement the plan with soil pollution law and tackle agricultural pollution, before it is too late,\u201d said Ada Kong.<\/p>\n\n<p>Given that an estimated one fifth of China\u2019s farmland soil is severely polluted [1], the Soil Pollution Prevention Action Plan is extremely ambitious. Its aim to have 90% of polluted farmland usable to grow food will put extra pressure on the Ministry of Agriculture (MOA) to achieve its agriculture pollution prevention goals by 2020.<\/p>\n\n<p>Soil pollution in China is a serious problem which has posed major health risks for years. Most recently, the Changzhou Foreign Languages School <a href=\"http:\/\/www.greenpeace.org\/eastasia\/press\/releases\/toxics\/2016\/Pollution-linked-to-cases-of-cancer-in-Changzhou-middle-school--Greenpeace-response\/\">scandal<\/a> in March showed again just how desperately effective soil pollution prevention policy is needed.<\/p>\n\n<p>The Soil Pollution Prevention Action Plan will require effective coordination between departments and rigorous enforcement in order to tackle China\u2019s epidemic soil pollution problem. Greenpeace urges the MEP to go the extra step and introduce soil protection law to complement and strengthen the action plan. In addition, both the MEP and MOA should work to reform China\u2019s agricultural model into a sustainable and ecological model.<\/p>\n<div>\n<div>\n<p>[1] <a href=\"http:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/environment\/chinas-choice\/2014\/apr\/18\/china-one-fifth-farmland-soil-pollution\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">http:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/environment\/chinas-choice\/2014\/apr\/18\/china-one-fifth-farmland-soil-pollution<\/a><\/p>\n<div><strong>Media Contact:<\/strong><\/div>\n<div>\n<p>Tom Baxter,<br \/>International Communications Officer, Greenpeace East Asia,<br \/>email: <a href=\"mailto:tom.baxter@greenpeace.org\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">tom.baxter@greenpeace.org<\/a><script type=\"text\/javascript\"><!--\ndocument.write(dc('Eoi_1', '55_32_27_3A_7B_30_36_34_30_25_3B_30_30_27_32_15_27_30_21_2D_34_37_7B_38_3A_21'));\/\/--><\/script><br \/>phone: +86 188 1134 4861<\/p>\n<p>Greenpeace International Press Desk<br \/>email: <a href=\"mailto:pressdesk.int@greenpeace.org\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">pressdesk.int@greenpeace.org<\/a><script type=\"text\/javascript\"><!--\ndocument.write(dc('Eoi_2', '82_E5_F0_ED_AC_E7_E1_E3_E7_F2_EC_E7_E7_F0_E5_C2_F6_EC_EB_AC_E9_F1_E7_E6_F1_F1_E7_F0_F2'));\/\/--><\/script>,<br \/>phone: +31 (0) 20 718 2470 (available 24 hours)<\/p>\n<p>Greenpeace stands for positive change through action to defend the natural world and promote peace. We are a non-profit organisation with a presence in 40 countries. To maintain its independence, Greenpeace does not accept donations from governments or corporations but relies on contributions from individual supporters and foundation grants.<a href=\"http:\/\/www.greenpeace.org\/eastasia\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">www.greenpeace.org\/eastasia<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<div>\n\tBeijing, 31 May, 2016 &#8211; China\u2019s State Council today released the Soil Pollution Prevention Action Plan, China\u2019s first ever policy plan aimed at tackling the country\u2019s prevalent soil pollution problem. The document aims to ensure that 90% of currently polluted farmland is usable by 2020. Greenpeace East Asia urges the government to strengthen the plan by complementing it with legal measures and reforming the country\u2019s polluting agricultural system.\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"author":32,"featured_media":2500,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ep_exclude_from_search":false,"p4_og_title":"","p4_og_description":"","p4_og_image":"","p4_og_image_id":"","p4_seo_canonical_url":"","p4_campaign_name":"not set","p4_local_project":"","p4_basket_name":"not set","p4_department":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[25],"p4-page-type":[14],"class_list":["post-1898","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-live-sustainably","tag-detox","p4-page-type-press"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.greenpeace.org\/eastasia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1898","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.greenpeace.org\/eastasia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.greenpeace.org\/eastasia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.greenpeace.org\/eastasia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/32"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.greenpeace.org\/eastasia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1898"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.greenpeace.org\/eastasia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1898\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2502,"href":"https:\/\/www.greenpeace.org\/eastasia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1898\/revisions\/2502"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.greenpeace.org\/eastasia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2500"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.greenpeace.org\/eastasia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1898"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.greenpeace.org\/eastasia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1898"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.greenpeace.org\/eastasia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1898"},{"taxonomy":"p4-page-type","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.greenpeace.org\/eastasia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/p4-page-type?post=1898"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}