Environmental cost and pollution risk caused by the industrial transfer in Qinghai Province

Abstract

With the rising pressure due to energy consumption and costs of environmental protection and recovery, industrial transfer from the eastern to central and western areas has surged in China. However, extremely fragile ecological conditions and severe water shortage are significant hurdles for industry development in Western China. Whether the vulnerable environment can bear the pollution caused by the transferred industry from Eastern China becomes a significant issue. This study firstly estimates energy and environmental costs in different areas of China, and assesses the necessity to upgrade the industrial structure of Qinghai Province. Then the emissions of waste water, waste gas, and smoke caused by transferred industries are calculated by Input-Output Model. On the basis of the effect analysis of waste emission on environment, pollution risks of Qinghai province are assessed. The results illustrate that the costs of environmental protection and recovery in China have a gradient distribution, of which the energy efficiency is lower while environmental costs are higher in Western China. Industrial structure adjustment has different impacts on the pollution of different sectors. Although the development of machinery and equipment, hotels and catering services, and real estate, leasing, and business services has increased the emission of pollutants, it is offset by the decreasing emissions caused by other industries such as construction and metal products. Therefore, although economic development will increase environmental pollution, industrial adjustments can effectively decrease waste water and waste gas emissions to reduce the pollution risk. It should be noted that there are still tremendous challenges for industrial transfer in Qinghai Province to coordinate the environment and industry development.

Keywords

environmental cost / industrial transfer / energy / pollution risk / Qinghai

Introduction

Industrial transfer, namely industrial relocation, refers to the process of transferring certain industries from one region to another, which happens between countries or regions (Hoover, 1937; Shafik and Bandyopadhyay, 1992; Christiansen et al., 2010; Liu et al., 2011). It is the inevitable demand of the optimization of the regional industrial pattern under the influence of the rules of market economy (Rodriguez-Clare, 1996; Kirkegaard, 2007). With the implementation and advance of the Great Western Development Strategy which has been put forward by the Central Government, there have been great changes in the pattern of regional economic development in China. There are increasingly more severe constraints on the industrial development in the eastern coastal region of China due to the environmental constraints and the tight supply of resources such as land, labor and energy. By comparison, there is greater advantage and scope for the industrial development in the middle and western regions of China due to the policy support and the gradually improved infrastructure (Lai, 2002; Fan, 2004). With this background, the industrial transfer from the eastern coastal region to the middle and western regions has been therefore inevitably accelerated, which is of great significance to accelerating the adjustment of the rational regional industrial structure and benign interaction among regions, promoting the upgrading of the industrial structure and narrowing the regional development gaps in China (Liu and Yeung, 2008; Liu et al., 2011).

Although the industrial transfer from the coastal region to Western China plays a positive role in promoting the economic development, it inevitably has some negative impacts as well (Zhao, 2007). The industries transferred to Western China (e.g., chemical, metallurgical and coal industries) generally consume considerable energy and water and significantly pollute the environment. Although these industries will promote the regional economic development to some extent, they may lead to serious regional environmental pollution (Liu et al., 2011; Yang and Chen, 2011). Due to the fragile ecological environment in the Western China, the expenses of environment damage will surpass the benefit from development if they are exploited without great care (Chen and Chen, 2009; Ouyang et al., 2009). This would not only influence sustainable development but also increase the external cost of the economic development of Western China, which has been the main obstacle of the industrial transfer from Eastern China to Western China. More and more attentions have been paid to whether the fragile ecological environment in Western China can bear the pollution brought by the industrial transfer (Panayotou, 1993; Liu et al., 2008; Ping et al., 2011). Therefore, it is of great significance to study the pollution risk brought by the industrial transfer to balance environmental protection and economic development.

In recent years, some researchers have qualitatively described the status of environmental pollution and proposed the countermeasures for the industrial transfer based on the analysis of the types of environmental impact caused by industrial transfer (Panayotou, 1993; Kander and Lindmark, 2006; Zhao, 2007). Additionally, some scholars applied the case studies on the relationship between the structure of transferred industries and the ecological and environmental quality to analyze the environmental pressure and risk brought by the industrial transfer (Krueger, 1991; Liu and Yeung, 2008; Ping et al., 2011). However, these researchers have only qualitatively identified and described the possible pollution due to the industrial transfer, and consequently there have not been any convincing research results on whether the fragile ecological environment in the Western China can bear the pollution due to additional industrial transfer.

As the source of three major rivers, including the Lancang River, Yellow River, and the Yangtze River which support most of the population of China, Qinghai is an important province in the process of the implementation of Great Western Development Strategy, and it is also one of the most undeveloped provinces with an extremely fragile ecology in China (Ping et al., 2011). The source of these rivers suffer from drought due to the ecological environment deterioration which may result in the middle and lower reaches running dry (Jin et al., 2010).The pollutants may float downstream and impact the whole lower reaches if the river source is polluted. Even if the ecology can be restored, the ecological restoration cost will be extremely high and far more than the gains (Cao and Long, 2009). Therefore it is of great significance for Qinghai Province and even the whole country to estimate and to monitor and the environmental pollution changes in a timely fashion, and to assess the pollution risk. Based on the statistical relationship between the environmental pollution and energy consumption in Qinghai Province, this study calculates the quantity of pollutant discharged during the industrial transfer process with an Input-Output Model and finally estimates the environmental and energy costs during the process of industrial transfer from the Eastern China to the Western China.

Data and methodology

Data and source

Economic and environmental data were mainly collected from the Qinghai Statistical Yearbook and the Chinese Provincial Input-Output Table in 2007 (Bureau of Statistics of Qinghai Province, 2008; National Bureau of Statistics, 2009). The sectors in the Input-Output Table were divided into three parts: primary, secondary, and tertiary industries. Furthermore, primary industries include the sectors of agriculture, forestry, animal husbandry and fishery. Secondary industries can also be classified into coal mining and washing; petroleum and gas drilling; metal and non-metal resources mining; manufacturing; production and supply of electricity, heat and water and construction industries. Tertiary industries are divided into transport-storage, education and other services.

Methodology

This study applies an Input-Output Model to estimate the pollution emission changes due to the industrial transfer in Qinghai Province. The conventional Input-Output Table does not include environmental protection in the national economic research plan; however, with the increasing concern over environmental problems since the 1970s, some economists have applied the Input-Output analysis method in the fields of environmental protection and constructed a series of Input-Output Models involving environmental issues to study the relationship between economic development and environmental protection (Okadera et al., 2006; Dietzenbacher and Velázquez, 2007). These studies divide the traditional industrial sectors into three parts: 1) primary energy sector; 2) second energy sector; 3) other sectors, and the corresponding input is also divided into three parts: 1) primary energy product; 2) second energy product; 3) other products. The pollutant emission row is added to the input columns (Table 1). This method is relatively simple and makes it easy to calculate the total pollutant emission of each sector and to analyze the relationship between the economic structure and waste generation (Cole, 2004).

Balance equations can be obtained from the view of the product balance and pollutant balance, and the balance equations of each sector are as follows:

(1){\displaystyle \sum _{i=\mathrm{1}}^n{u}_{ij}^e+u_{ij}^p+Y_i^e=X_i^e,(i,j=\mathrm{1},\mathrm{2}\cdots ,n),}

(2){\displaystyle \sum _{j=\mathrm{1}}^n{u}_{ij}^p+q_{ij}^e+N_i^e=Z_i^e,}(i,j=\mathrm{1},\mathrm{2}\cdots ,n)

(3)X_i^e=Z_i^e,

Insert the direct consumption coefficient into the balance equation, and then obtain the following equations:

(4){\displaystyle \sum _{i=\mathrm{1}}^n{a}_{ij}{u}_{ij}^e+u_{ij}^p+Y_i^e=X_i^e,(i,j=\mathrm{1},\mathrm{2}\cdots ,n),}

(5){\displaystyle \sum _{j=\mathrm{1}}^n{a}_{ij}{u}_{ij}^p+q_{ij}^e+N_i^e=Z_i^e,(i,j=\mathrm{1},\mathrm{2}\cdots ,n),}

where a_ij is the direct consumption coefficient. To make the analysis convenient, the direct consumption coefficient is usually represented by a matrix, which is called the direct consumption coefficient matrix and usually symbolized by A. The full demand coefficient matrix can be obtained from\overline{B}={(I-A)}^{-\mathrm{1}}, b_ij is the element of the matrix B, also called the full demand coefficient.

The influence coefficient represents the promoting effect of one sector on other sectors, and it can be calculated with the following equation:

(6){\delta }_j={\displaystyle \raisebox{1ex}{${\displaystyle {\sum }_i{\overline{b}}_{ij}}$}\!\left/ \!\raisebox{-1ex}{${\displaystyle \frac{\mathrm{1}}{n}}{\displaystyle {\sum }_j{\displaystyle {\sum }_i{\overline{b}}_{ij}(j=\mathrm{1},\mathrm{2},\cdots n),}}$}\right.}

The response coefficient represents the response sensitivity of one sector to the demand of other sectors, and it can be estimated by the following equation:

(7){\theta }_j={\displaystyle \raisebox{1ex}{${{\displaystyle {\sum }_i\overline{b}}}_{\mathrm{0}}$}\!\left/ \!\raisebox{-1ex}{${\displaystyle \frac{\mathrm{1}}{n}}{\displaystyle {\sum }_i{\displaystyle {\sum }_j{\overline{b}}_{ij}(i=\mathrm{1},\mathrm{2},\cdots n),}}$}\right.}

The basic equation for pollutant estimation is as follows:

(8)E_i={\displaystyle \sum _{i=\mathrm{1}}^n(W_i\times U_{ij}),(i,j=\mathrm{1},\mathrm{2},\mathrm{3}),}

where E_i means the total amount of pollutant emitted by sector i; W_i is the pollutant emission coefficient of sector i; U_ij is the amount of resource or energy j consumed by sector i.

Results and discussion

Comparison of energy, resource consumption and environmental costs of cities in different areas of China

Energy, resource consumption and environmental costs are related to location, physical features, natural environment and socio-economic development. These criteria vary between coastal areas and inland Western China. As a result, there are huge differences for energy, resource consumption and environmental costs during the development process. In this study, the average energy and resource consumption efficiency and the average waste emission per 10⁴ GDP from 2002 to 2007 are used to illustrate the energy consumption and environmental cost level. The statistical data indicates that the energy consumption in Western China reaches 1800 kws/10⁴ CNY, which is 45.3% higher than that in Eastern China (Fig. 1). In terms of water efficiency, the difference is slight. Western China is a little higher than Eastern China by 2.2 ton/10⁴ CNY, about 6.4% of Eastern China. On the other hand, the Eastern China has lower efficiency for gas consumption than Western China. Because gas resources mainly distribute in Western or Central China, it costs Eastern China more in transport, process, and storage. On the whole, energy consumption in Eastern China is lower than that in Western China except for gas.

Waste emission, which is indicated as the environmental potential of pollution, mainly includes waste water, SO₂ and smoke and dust. Western China is a fragile ecological zone that is more sensitive to environmental pollution. Therefore, even though they have the same level of waste emissions as Eastern China, Western China is more strongly influenced. Take waste water as an example, the impact would be terrible if the source water of the two major rivers in China were polluted by waste water. Although the waste water per unit GDP of Eastern China is similar to that of Western China (Fig. 2), it is essential to realize that environmental cost of Western China is much higher than that of the East because it will cost more to protect and recover the environment in Western China. Air pollution is considerably more critical in the West, and SO₂ emissions are up to 450 ton/10⁸ CNY, about three times as that of East (Fig. 2). As for smoke and dust emissions, 148.7 tons are released into air when 10⁸ CNY GDP is generated in Western China, while about 159.8 tons are emitted in Eastern China (Fig. 2). It is concluded that environmental pollution in Western China is higher than that in coastal areas if we produce the same value products. Accordingly the cost to treat is also higher due to the fragile ecology of Western China. Therefore, the government should be careful with industrial transfer to the West, especially those industries with heavy emissions and cannot accept all proposed industrial transfers indiscriminately simply to develop the local economy.

The necessity to upgrade the industrial structure of Qinghai Province

Current industrial structure in Qinghai Province

Since the implementation of the Great Western Development Strategy in 2000, the output value of the three major industries of Qinghai Province have all increased and have greatly changed industrial structure. With the adjustment of industrial structure, the percent of output value of three major industries (primary, secondary and tertiary industries) to the gross output value have changed from 15.2︰41.3︰43.5 in 2000 to 10.0︰55.1︰34.9 in 2010 (Fig. 3). What’s more, with the gradual decrease of the proportion of primary industries, the percentage of secondary industries has increased year after year and has surpassed that of tertiary industries, which has been generally very stable. This change indicates that the main industrial structure adjustment has been the transfer of labor from primary industries to secondary industries. The percentage of secondary industries has been the highest, followed by the tertiary industries then primary industries, and there is an increasingly significant gap between the percentage of secondary industries and that of primary and tertiary industries.

According to the Petty-Clark Theorem, with the increase of the per capita income, labor first transfers from primary industries to secondary industries (Kawata, 2011); with the further increase of per capita income, labor will transfer to tertiary industries. Qinghai Province has been at the stage of the transfer of labor from primary industries to secondary and tertiary industries, and the industrial structure adjustment is still focused on the adjustment of tertiary industries, including not only increasing its share but also reorganizing its current structure. The industrial structure changes in Qinghai Province suggest that there was more pollution due to secondary industry ratio growth, and it is urgent to upgrade the industrial structure.

The correlation analysis of economic growth and environmental pollution

This study explores the relationship between economic development and environmental pollution. According to the scatter plots of waste water and SO₂ emissions versus per capita GDP of Qinghai Province and the corresponding trend lines, the waste water discharge and SO₂ emissions show an increasing trend with economic growth, but the growth ratio becomes smaller and smaller (Fig. 4). This trend means that although waste water discharge and SO₂ emissions keep rising with economic growth from 1990 to 2010, the emission growth ratio is less than the resident income increasing ratio. Therefore, there are tremendous challenges in Qinghai Province, because environmental quality cannot turn better by itself especially when the environment is polluted seriously. Technological progress and industrial structure adjustment may be the main measures to alleviate pollution, thus it is significant to adjust industrial structure to guarantee the economic growth and environmental protection simultaneously in Qinghai Province.

The relationship between smoke and dust emissions and per capita GDP was also estimated. The fitting results indicate that there is an inflection point of the smoke and dust emissions with the economic growth, and Qinghai Province has passed this inflection point; i.e., it has entered the stage at which the dust emissions decrease with the economic growth (Fig. 4). The trend line is not fitted well. However, if we ignore the trend line and just observe the per capita smoke and dust emission changes after per capita GDP reaches the inflection point; there is no obvious reduction or growth. Therefore, it is still hard to say that Qinghai province has grown into the stage in which economic growth can relieve the pollution. Taking measures such as industrial adjustment is urgent for Qinghai Province to reduce the pollution caused by economic development, especially secondary industry growth.

Industrial transfer in Qinghai Province

This study applies the percentage change of the output value of each industrial sector to the corresponding sector of the whole country to analyze the changes of industrial structure and the development trends of different sectors during 2002-2007 at the regional scale on the basis of the provincial and national statistical data (Fig. 6). In addition, the output value change of Qinghai Province from 2002 to 2007 is also estimated to make not only the industrial structure but also the economic development of Qinghai Province clear (Fig. 5). The results indicate that there was no significant change in the percentage of Qinghai Province to output value of the whole country from the sector of agriculture, forestry, animal husbandry and fishery during 2002-2007, decreasing by only 0.002% (Fig. 6). It suggests that the development speeds of sectors of agriculture, forestry, animal husbandry and fishery of Qinghai Province were approximately equal to the national average level. However, the output value of the primary industries (sectors of agriculture, forestry, animal husbandry and fishery)of Qinghai Province increased by 74.42% from 2002 to 2007, indicating that local primary industries still developed very quickly compared to those in year 2002 (Fig. 5).

There was a decrease in the percentages of output value of most sectors of secondary industries of Qinghai Province to those of the whole country to different degrees, except the sector of coking, gas and petroleum refining, sector of machinery and equipment, and sector of waste (Fig. 6). The percentages of the output values of Qinghai Province to those of whole country from the sector of food stuff and tobacco and the sector of construction in the national total decreased most greatly, by 0.116% and 0.114%, respectively (Fig. 6). The development of the two sectors is closely related with the urbanization level and the local living standard, and it means that the low level economic development of Qinghai Province as well as low urbanization level results in a slower development of these two sectors compared to the national average. Additionally, there was also a decrease in the percentages of the output value of the sector of production and supply of electric power, heat power and water and the sector of metal products of Qinghai Province to those of the whole country, by 0.086% and 0.061%, respectively (Fig. 6). Both of these two sectors are energy-intensive and heavily polluting, though upgrading to a more efficient, industrial mode of production reduces the pollution. In addition, the percentages of the output value of Qinghai Province to the whole country from the sector of mineral products, the sector of textile, sewing, leather and fur products, and the sector of building materials and non-metal also decreased. What’s more, although there was an increase of the percentage output values of Qinghai Province to the whole country from the sector of coking, gas and petroleum refining, the sector of machinery and equipment, and the sector of waste, their growth rates were very limited, which were only 0.034%、0.014% and 0.004%, respectively (Fig. 7). On the whole, the percentage of output value of the secondary industries of Qinghai Province in the national total in 2007 was smaller than it was in 2002. This decrease indicates that the development of the secondary industries of Qinghai Province was still relatively slow compared to the other regions of China, although these industries have developed more rapidly when compared to the primary and tertiary industries in Qinghai Province.

Although tertiary industries developed more slowly than secondary industries, there was a slight increase in some sectors of the tertiary industry in Qinghai Province, e.g., the sector of wholesale and retail trades and hotels and catering services, the sector of banking and insurance, and the sector of real estate, leasing and business services (Fig. 7). During 2002-2007, the sector of banking and insurance developed most quickly, the percentage of which to the whole country increased by 0.139% (Fig. 7). The economy of Qinghai Province is relatively backward, but the speed of economic development has accelerated in recent years, with the rapidly developing banking business providing the funds for this development. However, it is worth noting that some significant sectors in Qinghai Province have developed more slowly than the national average. For example, the sector of transportation, postal, and telecommunication services, the sector of education, culture and medical service, and the sector of technology and research have developed very slowly. Because all of these sectors provide high-quality talents, techniques, and fundamental factors to economic development, it is foreseeable that the development speed of Qinghai Province will continue to be slower than those of other regions, and it is very unlikely that the region will catch up to or surpass the developed areas in Central and Eastern China.

Pollution risk assessment under the industrial transfer in Qinghai province

Roles of industries in economic growth

The various industries play different roles in regional economic development. Some industries take the leading position and play a key role in guiding and promoting economic development and adjustment of industrial structure. It is of great significance to improve the adjustment of industrial structure to accelerate healthy economic development and increase the economic performance.

The response and influence coefficients are two salient parameters illustrating the role of one industry in guiding and promoting the economic development. The influence coefficient represents the promoting effect of one sector on other sectors. An influence coefficient greater than 1 indicates the influence of products in the j^th sector on other sectors surpasses the average level of influence of all the sectors; an influence coefficient equal to 1 indicates the influence of products in the j^th sector is consistent with the average level; and an influence coefficient less than 1 indicates the influence of products in the j^th sector is below the average level. The response coefficient represents the response sensitivity of one sector to the demand of other sectors. A response coefficient above 1 indicates the response sensitivity of the products of the j^th sector to the demand of other sectors is above the average level of all the sectors; a response coefficient equal to 1 indicates the response sensitivity of products in the j^th sector is consistent with the average level; and a response coefficient less than 1 indicates a response sensitivity of products in the j^th sector below the average level.

This study estimates the influence coefficient and response coefficient of sectors of Qinghai Province based on the Input-Output Model (Fig. 8). The estimation results indicate there are 6 sectors with an influence coefficient above 1 among the 20 sectors of Qinghai Province. The influence coefficients of the sector of coking, gas and petroleum refining, the sector of mineral products, the sector of chemical industry, the sector of construction, the sector of banking and insurance, and the sector of other services are 3.11, 1.12, 1.29, 3.32, 1.81, and 1.22, respectively. The results indicate that the sector of construction played the most important role in promoting the economic development of Qinghai Province, followed by the sector of coking, gas and petroleum refining. Most of the sectors mentioned above have great impacts on economic growth and change of the industrial structure of Qinghai Province and play a role in promoting the development of other sectors. These sectors determine the characteristics and evolving trend of the industrial structure of Qinghai Province to a great degree, and it is important to promote the economic growth to accelerate the development of these sectors.

The data in Fig. 8 suggests there are 3 sectors with the response coefficient above 1, i.e., the sector of production and supply of electric power, heat power and water, the sector of waste, and the sector of other manufacturing, the response coefficients of these being 1.17, 1.12, and 7.88, respectively. These numbers indicate that the response sensitivity of these three sectors to the demand of other sectors is higher than the average level of all the sectors. These three sectors are the limiting factors of the economic development in Qinghai Province, and they will be the first to suffer when there is rapid economic growth.

Influence of adjustment of industrial structure on pollutant discharge

The waste water, SO₂, and smoke and dust emission factors of the twenty sectors in Qinghai Province are estimated on the basis of the statistical data of waste discharge and total output value of each sector in 2007. The total quantity of these three pollutant groups discharged by each sector was further estimated on the basis of the Input-Output Table. This estimation indicated a decreasing trend of the discharge of these pollutants due to the adjustment of industrial structure in Qinghai Province during 2002-2007.

The waste water discharged by the sector of machinery and equipment increased most greatly, 402 million tons, due to the adjustment of industrial structure during 2002-2007 (Table 2). The sector of real estate, leasing and business services and the sector of wholesale and retail trades, hotels and catering services follow, increasing their waste water discharge by 96 million tons and 46 million tons, respectively. In addition, there was a slight increase of the waste water discharged by the sector of waste and the sector of coking, gas and petroleum refining. The waste water discharged by the sector of construction decreased most greatly (1.8337 million tons) due to the adjustment of industrial structure. The sector of textile, sewing, leather and fur products and the sector of metal products come next, decreasing their waste water discharge by 0.08316 million tons and 0.03411 million tons. There was only a slight decrease in the waste water discharged by the other sectors.

The sectors with increased SO₂ emission due to the adjustment of industrial structure are the same as that of the waste water discharge, and their SO₂ emission showed a similar changing trend. However, the sectors with decreased SO₂ emission were very different. SO₂ emission declined most greatly in the sector of transportation, postal and telecommunication services, the sector of textile, sewing, leather and fur products, and the sector of metal products, with decreases of 2.7528 million tons, 2.8752 million tons and 1.0815 million tons, respectively. The sector of food stuff and tobacco, the sector of building materials and non-metal, and the sector of other services follow, but the SO₂ emission of these sectors decreased much less than that of the previous three sectors.

The smoke and dust discharge of the sector of machinery and equipment increased most greatly (32.7 thousand tons) due to the adjustment of industrial structure. The sector of real estate, leasing and business services and the sector of wholesale and retail trades, hotels and catering services follow, increasing by 23 thousand tons and 9.8 thousand tons, respectively. The greatest decreases of smoke and dust discharge due to the adjustment of industrial structure lay with the sector of textile, sewing, leather and fur products and the sector of metal products, with decrements of 714.3 thousand tons and 317.9 thousand tons, respectively. The sector of building materials and non-metal, the sector of food stuff and tobacco, and the sector of construction follow but with decrements of no more than 10% of that of the sector of textile, sewing, leather and fur products. The smoke and dust discharge of the sector of agriculture, forestry, animal husbandry and fishery and the sector of other services decreased most slightly, with decrements of only 0.2 thousand tons and 0.3 thousand tons, respectively.

Pollution risk assessment of adjustment of industrial structure

According to the analysis of the influence of economic growth on pollutant discharge, Qinghai Province remains at the stage in which pollutant discharge increases with the economic growth. On the one hand, economic development will inevitably aggravate environmental pollution. On the other hand, the analysis above suggests that the adjustment of industrial structure played a role in controlling the pollution and reducing the environmental risk of Qinghai Province to some degree. The reason lies in the fact that secondary industries, which are the most significant pollution sources, developed more slowly in Qinghai Province than in the rest of China. By contrast, the sector of education, culture and medical services and the sector of technology and research, which promote rapid economic development and cause less pollution, have developed more rapidly in Qinghai Province than in the rest of China. To date, industrial adjustment has reduced pollution in Qinghai Province to some extent. Regardless, further increases in pollution due to continued growth of most industrial sectors must be mitigated.

Conclusions

Based on the statistical data, this study analyzes energy cost and the relationship between the economic growth and pollutant discharge in Qinghai Province. The results indicate that most of the energy efficiency is lower in Western China, while the environmental cost is higher. There are more risks for Western China if we produce the same value products as other regions. The relationship between economic growth and pollutant discharge in Qinghai Province is that although pollutant discharge increases with per capita GDP, the growth ratio is decreasing. According to the current speed of economic growth, the pollution due to economic growth will still be very serious. This highlights the urgent necessity to optimize environmental protection and industrial development strategies by implementing “green” development.

According to the industrial structure changing trend of Qinghai, the percentages of secondary industries of Qinghai Province continuously increased during 2002-2007, but the development speeds of many sectors were still below the national average. The proportion of tertiary industries showed an increasing trend first then dropped slightly due to the rapid development of secondary industries. However, the development speeds of some key sectors were still higher and above the national average from 2002 to 2007. Primary industries showed a continuously decreasing trend, but their development speed was still approximately equal to the national average.

The pollutant discharge shows different changing trends due to the industrial structure adjustment. There is an increase of the pollutant discharge due to the development of the sector of machinery and equipment, the sector of real estate, leasing and business services, and the sector of wholesale and retail trades, hotels and catering services, but this increase is less than the decrease in other sectors such as that of construction and metal products due to other industrial structural changes. So the industrial structural changes during 2002-2007 played a role in controlling the pollutant discharge and reducing the pollution risk to some degree. However, it does not mean that we can relax with continued environmental and economic development. The growth of the output value of each industry still makes significant waste emission; therefore, it is urgent for Qinghai Province to handle the relationship between economic growth and pollution control properly by accelerating the upgrade of industrial structure and by reducing the pressure of pollutant discharge due to economic growth.

In view of the results mentioned above, it is necessary to slow down the development of the heavy industry and the chemical industry in the secondary industry category; the ratio of the tertiary industry should be promoted; and great attention should be paid to the development of new high technology industries, as well as education, tourism and service industries. More support should be provided to the leading industries, especially high efficiency industries with minimal emissions; it is necessary to accelerate the usage of foreign capital and the introduction of advanced technology and key equipment so as to promote the industrial structure adjustment and to upgrade the products of enterprises in Qinghai Province. In addition, it is necessary to pay more attention to pollution control and to carry out strict supervision of industries with pollution. Energy-saving, emission reduction technologies should be introduced, with preferential treatment shown to industries which can save resources and optimize the environment. Finally, technological transformation and equipment renewal should be promoted.

References

[1] Bureau of Statistics of Qinghai Province (1991-2011). <?Pub Caret?>Qinghai statistical yearbook. Beijing: China Statistics Press

[2] Cao G M, Long R J (2009). The bottleneck and its resolutions to the natural recovery of black soil type degraded grassland in the Three River Source Region. Acta Agrestia Sinica, 17(1): 4-9

[3] Chen B, Chen G Q (2009). Emergy-based energy and material metabolism of the Yellow River Basin. Commun Nonlinear Sci Numer Simul, 14(3): 923-934

[4] Christiansen O, Ehnts D H, Trautwein H (2010). Industry relocation, linkages and spillovers across the Baltic Sea: extending the footloose capital model. Baltic Journal of Economics. Baltic International Centre for Economic Policy Studies, 10(1): 61-78

[5] Cole M A (2004). Trade, the pollution haven hypothesis and the environmental Kuznets curve: examining the linkages. Ecol Econ, 48(1): 71-81

[6] Dietzenbacher E, Velázquez E (2007). Analysing and alusian virtual water trade in an input-output framework. Reg Stud, 41(2): 185-196

[7] Fan J (2004). Western development policy: changes, effects and evaluation. In: Yeung Y M, Shen J F eds. Developing China’s West: A Critical Path to Balanced National Development. Hong Kong: The Chinese University Press

[8] Hoover E M (1937). Location theory and the shoes and leather industry. Cambridge: Harvard University Press

[9] Jin Z D, You C F, Yu T L, Wang B S (2010). Sources and flux of trace elements in river water collected from the lake Qinghai catchment, NE Tibetan Plateau. Appl Geochem, 25(10): 1536-1546

[10] Kander A, Lindmark M (2006). Foreign trade and declining pollution in Sweden: a decomposition analysis of long-term structural and technological effects. Energy Policy, 34(13): 1590-1599

[11] Kawata Y (2011). Economic growth and trend changes in wildlife hunting. Acta Agric Slov, 97(2): 115-123

[12] Kirkegaard J F (2007). Offshoring, outsourcing, and production relocation: labor-market effects in the OECD countries and developing Asia. IIE Working Paper

[13] Krueger G G (1991). Environmental impacts of a North American free trade agreement. National Bureau Economic Research Working Paper 3914, NBER, Cambridge M A

[14] Lai H H (2002). China’s western development program: its rationale, implementation, and prospects. Mod China, 28(4): 432-466

[15] Liu G, Lucas M, Shen L (2008). Rural household energy consumption and its impacts one co-environment in Tibet: taking Taktse county as an example. Renew Sustain Energy Rev, 12(7): 1890-1908

[16] Liu H G, Liu W D, Liu Z G (2011). The quantitative study on inter-regional industry transfer. China Industrial Economics, (6): 79-88

[17] Liu W, Yeung H W (2008). China’s dynamic industrial sector: the automobile industry. Eurasian Geography and Economics, 49(5): 523-548

[18] National Bureau of Statistics (2009). Input-Output Tables of China. Beijing: China Statistics Press

[19] Okadera T, Watanabe M, Xu K Q (2006). Analysis of water demand and water pollutant discharge using a regional input-output table: an application to the city of Chongqing, upstream of the three gorges dam in China. Ecol Econ, 58(2): 2321-2371

[20] Ouyang Z Y, Zheng H, Huang B R (2009). Regional Ecosystem Assessment and Ecosystem Service Zoning. Beijing: China Environmental Science Press

[21] Panayotou T (1993). Empirical tests and policy analysis of environmental degradation at different stages of economic development. Technology, Environment and Employment, Geneva: International Labour Office

[22] Ping X G, Jiang Z G, Li C W (2011). Status and future perspectives of energy consumption and its ecological impacts in the Qinghai-Tibet region. Renew Sustain Energy Rev, 15(1): 514-523

[23] Rodriguez-Clare A (1996). Multinationals, linkages and economic development. Am Econ Rev, 88(5): 1290-1310

[24] Shafik N, Bandyopadhyay S (1992). Economic growth and environmental quality: time series and cross-country evidence back ground. Paper for World Development Report. World Bank

[25] Yang J, Chen B (2011). Using LMDI method to analyze the change of industrial CO₂ emission from energy use in Chongqing. Frontiers of Earth Science, 5(1): 103-109

[26] Zhao X Y (2007). Analysis of the industrial structure transformation and its eco-environment effect in Gansu. Areal Research and Development, 26(2): 102-106

RIGHTS & PERMISSIONS

Higher Education Press and Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg