Effective environmental management in China is the key to avoiding up to a quarter of all the ‘burden of disease’ associated with environmental factors. The aim of this concept paper is to highlight the importance of effctive control and management of these factors within a framework that enables government and governance to address the current and future challenges confronting China.

The paper reflects upon the major challenges confronting China, which now faces a triple burden of environmental risk: 1) those associated with  pre-industrialised worlds of subsistence agriculture, where lack of drinking water and poor sanitation cause illness; 2) industrialization and agriculture intensification, with its history of poor management of waste and inputs contributing to contamination of air, soil and water and food; and 3) a rapid race to the ‘post–industrial’ world of the service sector, with its associated ‘new’ epidemics of obesity and hypertension. While in large part the transition to a market economy in China has arrived, the transformation of environment and health policy and practice has been slow to respond to the unprecedented rate of change.

Download the Document