Prospects for Sustainable Development in the Chinese Countryside: The Political Economy of Chinese Ecological Agriculture by Richard Sanders

Author:Richard Sanders [Sanders, Richard]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: International Relations, Political Science, General
ISBN: 9781351792295
Google: EPqADwAAQBAJ
Goodreads: 15110905
Publisher: Routledge
Published: 2000-01-01T00:00:00+00:00

8(2)

Xiao Zhang Zhuang

8(2) 1. Introduction

Xiao Zhang Zhuang is a largish village of some 3502 people from 802 households and is one of 28 villages in the township of Xie Qiao in the Fuyang district of Yingshang County in the north of Anhui province. It has a total area of 422 hectares, 324 hectares of which is cultivated land, almost 1.6 mu per head, the rest being residential land, industrial land, forest and fishponds. It is situated in the southern part of the north Huai river plain (Huai Bei), an area of China notoriously prone to serious, at times disastrous floods. In the summer of 1991 a well publicised flood led to substantial loss of life and damage to property, while another serious flood in the summer of 1996, though not the cause of death led to substantial property damage (and difficulties in travelling to Xiao Zhang Zhuang). Anhui is traversed by the Huai River (Huai He) in the north and the Yangtse River (Chang Jiang) in the south and, with a rural per capita GDP of 1808 yuan in 1997 (Statistical Yearbook of China 1998, p.347), is in the poorest third of provinces in China.

Meanwhile, Xiao Zhang Zhuang is in one of the poorest regions of Anhui. It is situated about 50 kilometres from Fuyang, the capital of the district, and 20 kilometres from Yingshang, the county town. The new Beijing-Hong Kong railway opened in June 1997 stops in Fuyang, but the village remains in an isolated, rural location; there are still many parts of Anhui province out-of-bounds to foreigners without special permits and Xiao Zhang Zhuang was, until very recently, one of these. The car journeys from Bengbu, Northern Anhui’s largest town and from Hefei, Anhui’s capital, both take about 5 hours on uncomfortable roads. Northern Anhui is not only a region of material poverty but also of evident pollution: the Huai He itself is surrounded by industries discharging their waste into it: on the road from Bengbu to Yingshang, which crosses the Huai He lie any number of large industrial works, including chemical factories and iron works, emitting all sorts of pollutants of various colours and smells into the atmosphere.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.