Beijing smog prompts World Health Organisation to declare crisis

A thick blanket of smog covering much of northern China has led the World Health Organisation (WHO) to declare a crisis.

Beijing has recorded its sixth day in a row of hazardous pollution with residents being warned to wear masks or stay indoors as a precaution.

Instruments have measured pollution levels above 450 on an air quality index - nine times the safe level for human beings.

Skyscrapers in the Chinese capital are barely visible through the haze.

The smog is even threatening crops, local scientists say, with the lack of sunlight reportedly causing a drastic slowdown in plant photosynthesis.

The authorities raised the pollution alert to the second-highest "orange" danger level for the first time on Friday after drawing public ire for its ineffective response.

"Of course, on days where pollution levels reach or even exceed the scale we are very concerned and we have to see this as a crisis," Bernhard Schwartlander, the WHO representative in China, said.

"There's now clear evidence that, in the long term, high levels of air pollution can actually also cause ... lung cancer."

Authorities have introduced countless orders and policies and made innumerable vows to clean up the environment but the problem only seems to get worse.

The government has invested in projects and empowered courts to mete out stiff penalties but enforcement has been patchy at the local level, where authorities often depend on the taxes paid by the polluting industries.

Hebei, a major industrial region which surrounds Beijing, is home to some of the most polluted cities in China.

Shijiazhuang, the capital of Hebei province, routinely recorded "beyond index" measurements of particulate matter in early 2013.

The China Academy of Sciences identified the province as a major source of noxious smog that hung over Beijing a year ago.

The government said in an action plan for Hebei in September that it would ban new projects in certain industries, close outdated steel and cement facilities and slash coal use.

The province has promised to cut total steel capacity by 86 million tonnes - about 40 per cent of last year's production - by 2020. Official data suggests that is starting to happen.

Man tries to sue government over smog

Meanwhile, one man from a smoggy northern city has become the first person in the country to sue the government for failing to curb air pollution, a state-run newspaper reported on Tuesday.

Li Guixin, a resident of Shijiazhuang, has submitted his complaint to a district court, asking the Shijiazhuang Municipal Environmental Protection Bureau to "perform its duty to control air pollution according to the law", the Yanzhao Metropolis Daily said.

He is also seeking compensation from the agency for residents for the choking pollution that has engulfed Shijiazhuang, and much of northern China, this winter.

It is unclear whether the court will accept Mr Li's lawsuit.

"The reason that I'm proposing administrative compensation is to let every citizen see that amid this haze, we're the real victims," Mr Li was quoted as saying by the newspaper.

Mr Li says he spent money on face masks, an air purifier and a treadmill to get indoor exercise last December when the pollution was particularly severe.

"Besides the threat to our health, we've also suffered economic losses, and these losses should be borne by the government and the environmental departments because the government is the recipient of corporate taxes, it is a beneficiary," he said.

source: www.abc.net.au