East Asia: What Price Economic Growth?
International Herald Tribune
April 10, 1995
Michael Richardson 

Can the developing and newly industrializing nations of East Asia continue their supercharged economic growth without causing permanent damage to the environment and quality of life in the region?

A growing number of scientists and economists say that the speed and scale of East Asia's economic transformation are putting unsustainable strains on its vital natural resources. In the race to catch up with the West, these experts say, many East Asian nations seem to be overlooking the damage they are causing to the environment.

They warn that worsening air and water pollution, the widespread destruction of tropical forests and water catchment areas, and soil degradation are undermining the resource base of the region — the same resource base that makes possible rapid economic expansion and the development of consumer societies.

Asia has telescoped into a few decades a wrenching process of massive population increase, industrialization and urbanization that took a century or more in Europe and the United States. "What we're seeing in Asia is exponential growth in pollution, traffic and toxic wastes," said Carter Brandon, an economist in the environment and natural resources division of the World Bank in Washington.

"While the East Asian economies are doubling every 10 years or so, pollution, energy use and the number of vehicles on the road are increasing by factors of five, eight or even 10," he said. "The pollution trends are many times greater than the capacity of the environment to absorb it all."

Bumper-to-bumper traffic, serious air and water pollution, and squalid shantytowns are a feature of Bangkok, Jakarta, Manila, Seoul, Taipei, Beijing, Shenyang and many other East Asian cities.

Some World Bank economists estimate that pollution in Bangkok is costing Thailand up to $3 billion a year in lost productivity and health-care expenses, while urban pollution in South Korea is costing as much as $6 billion annually

Pollution control, environmental protection and the construction of related services such as sewerage and piped water supplies have been given low priority in East Asia, with the exception of Japan, Singapore and, to a lesser extent, Hong Kong and Malaysia.

Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad of Malaysia has warned that the country had to take urgent action to tackle the problem of growing amounts of industrial waste, but that the federal government had so far been unable to find a place for treating it.

He said a contract for construction of a waste treatment and disposal facility had been awarded to a Danish company, but that no state government in Malaysia was willing to allocate land for the project because of pollution fears.

World Bank officials say East Asia's economic growth could provide the technology, skills and financial resources to solve many of the region's environmental problems provided that comprehensive remedial programs are started now.

Mr. Brandon estimated that East Asian countries would need to mobilize an additional $25 billion a year by the end of the decade to clean up pollution and make economic growth more sustainable.

The World Bank is pressing regional governments to introduce a combination of tougher regulations and more liberal incentives to encourage industry to install clean technology.

The bank is also urging governments to eliminate subsidies on water, electricity and fuels to reduce waste and inefficiency.

Kirk R. Smith, a senior fellow in the environment program at the East-West Center in Hawaii, said that East Asian

'If you amass a natural debt that is too large, you will be paying it off for many generations.'

nations had been building up a "natural debt" by borrowing resources from nature to make their economies grow faster.

"A bit of debt is not necessarily a bad thing if you get more human welfare out of it and more capacity to repair the damage caused to the environment," he said. "But if you amass a natural debt that is too large, then you will be paying it off for many generations with polluted water and air, contaminated soil and dead forests."

Across East Asia, millions of people each year are migrating from the countryside to towns and cities in search of jobs and a better standard of living.

As forests are cut down and farm land turned to other uses, questions are being raised by scientists about Asia's ability to provide adequate food, shelter and clothing for its people in a tolerable environment.

Noting that under the constitution, land in Indonesia is to be used for the prosperity of the population and should not become an object for speculation, President Suharto recently urged officials to prevent the conversion of irrigated land, especially rice fields, to nonagricultural purposes.

He said Indonesia should strive to maintain the self-sufficiency in rice production it achieved in 1984 by safeguarding productive rice fields.

With 2.8 billion people, or more than half of the global population, Asia has only 23 percent of the world's land area.

Klaus Lampe, director-general of the International Rice Research Institute in the Philippines, said that about 2.5 million hectares (6 million acres) of East Asian forest were disappearing each year, along with hundreds of thousands of hectares of arable land, leading to erosion and declining soil fertility.

He said damage to forest catchment areas for water in East Asia was extensive. "Most of the floods and natural disasters in and around the lowland cities are bills being paid for upland deforestation and other abuses of the ecosystem," Mr. Lampe added.

According to United Nations estimates, 2.3 billion people will live in Asia's cities and towns by 2020, an estimated 25 percent of the global population then and a number almost equal to the entire urban population in the world today. As a result, Asian urban centers will have to accomodate an additional 1.4 billion people by 2020.

"Without substantial improvement in their management, many Asian cities could become the most polluted human settlements in the world," said Daniel Ritchie, director of the Asia Technical Department of the World Bank.

Such a development, he said, would "slow down much of the region's economic growth, and generate a major portion of the hydrocarbons and other pollutants" responsible for global warming and environmental decay.

MICHAEL RICHARDSON is editor for Asia of the International Herald Tribune.

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