- Title: CHINA: Waste from booming textile industry is poisoning rivers say Greenpeace
- Date: 1st December 2010
- Summary: (SOUNDBITE) (English) GREENPEACE TOXICS CAMPAIGNER, YAN ZHAO, SAYING: "We have actually interviewed students who are teenagers and they can't actually remember the rivers being clean. And of those middle-aged men, they can still remember swimming in those rivers and fishing in those rivers. They can no longer do that anymore. And their children can no longer do that anymor
- Embargoed: 16th December 2010 12:00
- Keywords:
- Location: China
- Country: China
- Topics: Environment / Natural World,Industry
- Reuters ID: LVA261NQVZBG7O4VVN8D4IWKQGP9
- Story Text: Clothing production clusters around China are poisoning the country's rivers with heavy metals and other chemicals, as the textile industry grows and consumers worldwide enjoy low garment prices, a new Greenpeace report has said.
Xintang (pron: sin-tang) in southern China's Guangdong (pron: gwang-dong) province is an economic success story: in 2008 it produced 260 million pairs of jeans, more than 60 percent of the national production and equivalent to 40 percent of U.S. jeans consumption that year.
However, the air in China's 'Jeans Town' is heavily polluted and Dong River, which runs through Xintang, is blackened and covered in foam, a Greenpeace video handout shows.
The water quality deteriorated seriously over the last three decades, as Xintang's textile export industry grew to over 28 billion yuan per annum ($4.3 billion USD).
"We have actually interviewed students who are teenagers and they can't actually remember the rivers being clean. And of those middle-aged men, they can still remember swimming in those rivers and fishing in those rivers. They can no longer do that anymore. And their children can no longer do that anymore, " said Greenpeace Toxics Campaigner Yan Zhao (pron: yen jaow).
Residents of Gurao (pron: goo-raow), a town producing 200 million bras a year located around 300 kilometres west of Xintang, have similar complaints about the Xiaoxi (pron: seeaw-see) river.
The dying, washing, bleaching and printing of the garments all use large quantities of heavy metals and other chemicals, and toxic waste water is often illegally discharged into surrounding rivers, Greenpeace says.
The environmental protection organization found heavy metals in 17 of the 21 samples they took from Dong and Xiaoxi rivers, with cadmium levels sometimes reaching 128 times the national standard, and strongly alkaline water reaching pH values of 11.95.
"Actually, Xintang and Gurao are not unique cases. They are 133 textile industrial clusters like Xintang and Gurao according to the statistics of the China Textile Association. So, we are really afraid that this is just the tip of the iceberg," Yan Zhao said.
These clusters produce 40 percent of China's textile industry's total economic output, much of whichup in the hands of consumers in the United States, Europe and Japan, according to statistics from the China National Textile and Apparel Council.
Although the Chinese government has vowed to pay more attention to the environment, Zhao thinks that neither its policy enforcement nor general consumer awareness are sufficient.
"According to our investigations, the governments have actually taken some measures to tackle the problem. But I don't think that the level of awareness and the level of priority and the level of implementation is there already. So I think that the government should definitely do more to tackle this problem," she said.
In 2006, the local government closed down some dying and washing plants, which then simply moved from eastern Xintang to western Xintang, Greenpeace said.
China's gross output value of textiles grew by 10.3 percent in 2009, according to the China National Textile and Apparel Council.
A lifting of barriers to Chinese textile imports contributed to prices falling by 25 percent in the U.S. in 2009, leading to even cheaper clothing for U.S. consumers.
While environmental degradation is seen as a problem, it remains to be seen whether Chinese firms, local governments and global consumers are willing to sacrifice economic success or a cheaper pair of jeans for a cleaner environment. - Copyright Holder: REUTERS
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