China plans to clear the air for the Games

BEIJING - China's capital was a city of blue skies and open roads when Robin Howlett arrived from the United Kingdom in 1988. These days, he rides his scooter wearing a surgical mask to keep out dust and fumes from Beijing's 8000 construction sites and more than 2 million vehicles.

"It's bad but this is my home," said the restaurant owner, 38. Pollution and traffic congestion were "just part and parcel of living in Beijing".

Beijing, with 1 per cent of China's population, has at least 5 per cent of its cars - and the number is increasing by more than 750 a day.

While the city has pledged to halt all construction projects in 2008 to clear the air for the Olympic Games, the volume of traffic is likely to keep growing.

"This city is going to become unliveable" unless limits are imposed on the number of vehicles, says Gilbert Van Kerckhove, director of Beijing Global Strategy Consulting, which is advising Beijing's Government on pre-Olympics development. "It will not be sustainable."

Beijing is spending US$13 billion ($21 billion) to clean up pollution before the Games. The city's air pollution reached a concentration equal to that of New York, Chicago and Atlanta combined in 2004, the US Embassy says. Nitrogen oxide levels were 44 per cent above World Health Organisation standards.

Last year, the level of sulfur dioxide was 11 times higher than in Tokyo and 3.5 times higher than in Hong Kong, says a report by CLSA, the Asian investment banking unit of France's Credit Agricole. It said Singapore had the cleanest air among Asian cities.

"The reason behind Beijing's air quality problem is cars," said Pan Yue, vice-minister of the State Environmental Protection Administration.

"Tremendous environmental problems have been created as a result of this industry's growth."

Private cars, almost unknown in Beijing 15 years ago, are proliferating as rising incomes make them affordable to more people.

Disposable incomes in Beijing jumped 11 per cent to an average 17,653 yuan ($3600) last year and are up 70 per cent from 2000.

For many of Beijing's young professionals, a car is a symbol of freedom and middle-class status as well as a means of transport. Fifty-eight per cent of Beijing residents said owning a car was their "biggest dream", a McKinsey & Co survey found.

Insurance underwriter Song Lifang, 28, bought her first car this month, ignoring objections from her husband, who was concerned that driving on Beijing's gridlocked streets would be a chore.

"After I bought the car, he changed his mind," said Song, who paid 200,000 yuan ($41,000) for a two-door Peugeot 307. "It has changed our lives for the better. It brings us more happiness than most material goods can."

Beijing may need to impose curbs similar to those in Singapore, where quotas, taxes and licence fees help control the number of cars on the road.

Would-be owners first must bid for the right to buy a vehicle and registration fees for new cars exceed the value of the vehicle, says Singapore's Land Transport Authority.

Motorists must also pay electronic toll charges, which vary at different times of the day, and submit to mandatory emission-control inspections.

Still, cars in Beijing aren't the only culprits. Coal-burning homes and factories spew smoke into the atmosphere, and the city is plagued by dust storms that sweep in from surrounding Hebei province and Inner Mongolia - the result of development and deforestation in the past decade.

The Government is moving coal-burning heavy industries such as Beijing Shougang, China's fourth-largest steel-maker, out of the city and plans to make all households use natural gas by 2008.

Even so, Beijing Mayor Wang Qishan says he may be fighting a losing battle in a bid for clear skies.

"The whole world has very high expectations for the 2008 Olympic Games," Wang said. "It is very hard for me, I'm afraid, to do something that will be a pleasant surprise."

Beijing's Olympic organising committee promised to bring the city's air quality within WTO standards in time for the games. It was a matter of face for Beijing and the Government to keep that promise, said Hu Dayuan, an environmental economist at Peking University.

Beijing faces "an extremely grim challenge" in meeting this year's target of 237 days with good or moderate air quality, says the city's environmental protection bureau. The city missed its target for "blue sky" days in the first quarter.

The number of cars in Beijing rose 15 per cent to 2.15 million last year, says the Beijing Municipal Bureau of Statistics, which counts only vehicles registered in the city.

The US Embassy estimated the number of vehicles at 2.5 million at the end of 2004.

Recent Government policies to encourage ownership of small cars are likely to spur growth. Beijing also is building four subway lines to encourage more people to use public transport, part of a US$60 billion pre-Olympics infrastructure spending spree.

But insurance worker Song, who lives beside a subway line, said: "Public transport is too inconvenient."

- BLOOMBERG