Pollution, Made in China. Should customers be blamed too?

By: Shahab Sabahi, Policy Analyst in Energy Security and Policy Research Group

A question ran through my mind when I came across an article on Climate Change. It may find interest of you too.

However the discussion on Climate Change runs out of steam and is overshadowed by some overwhelming and pressing today-challenges. The challenges range from preserving regional security and defusing conflicts to mending flaws in the economic structure. But it is worth, just a touch, revisiting the responsibility of air pollution from a realistic economic perspective.  

China is now the world's leading contributor to greenhouse gas emissions, and its largest cities are choked with some of the worst smog on the planet. However a large share of China's pollutants is generated during the manufacture of goods for export and destined to other countries [the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS)].

In the study, researchers found that, in 2006 alone, about a fifth to a third of China's air pollutants—which include sulfur dioxide, nitrogen oxides, and carbon monoxide—were associated with the production of goods for export, and that about a fifth of those amounts were linked to the production of goods for the United States.

The PNAS study places responsibility for China's pollution. But the goods are produced to satisfy demand of consumers who live somewhere else. The question one may raise “whom should be blamed for air pollution emissions?”. Do both producing and consuming nations have share responsibility for emissions generated during the production of export goods?

In a broader view, I think we should put responsibility on those also who are consumers as well as those who produce emissions. Electricity generations and goods productions do not occurred – in the first place there are demand and places where those go. That is the demand side and we should take into account the demand aspect. Perhaps a consumer-based way of looking at pollution is better than just looking at who's producing it.