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Farmland sinks as coal mines expand below
By Wang Yong |
June 30, 2010, Wednesday
|
Print Edition
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IT'S all about state-driven growth at the cost of the environment and distributive justice.
Coal mine owners are so rich that they drive luxury cars exceeding your wildest imagination. But peasants are starving, as farmland has literally sunk due to the burrowing beneath them as the mining industry expands relentlessly.
Xinhua reported yesterday that over exploitation by prodigiously expanding coal mines had destroyed farmland and worsened income gaps in the triangle that encompasses coal-rich Shanxi and Shaanxi provinces and the Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region.
In Shenmu County of Sha'anxi Province, nearly 70 square meters of land have sunk, removing around 7,000 farmers from the very land they live on. Local governments benefit greatly from coal mine revenues and so do many state-owned mining companies.
Therefore, it's not just a handful of private coal bosses who have driven poor farmers into even deeper poverty. It's the state-driven model of economic growth as seen in many parts of the country.
Xinhua cited an official from Shanxi Province as saying that under this model "a few 'haves' have glossed over the poverty of myriad 'have-nots,' and handsome government revenues have concealed the hard life of ordinary people."
Don't blame the coal bosses who flaunt their wealth. It's the system that allowed them to grow like monsters.
Coal mine owners are so rich that they drive luxury cars exceeding your wildest imagination. But peasants are starving, as farmland has literally sunk due to the burrowing beneath them as the mining industry expands relentlessly.
Xinhua reported yesterday that over exploitation by prodigiously expanding coal mines had destroyed farmland and worsened income gaps in the triangle that encompasses coal-rich Shanxi and Shaanxi provinces and the Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region.
In Shenmu County of Sha'anxi Province, nearly 70 square meters of land have sunk, removing around 7,000 farmers from the very land they live on. Local governments benefit greatly from coal mine revenues and so do many state-owned mining companies.
Therefore, it's not just a handful of private coal bosses who have driven poor farmers into even deeper poverty. It's the state-driven model of economic growth as seen in many parts of the country.
Xinhua cited an official from Shanxi Province as saying that under this model "a few 'haves' have glossed over the poverty of myriad 'have-nots,' and handsome government revenues have concealed the hard life of ordinary people."
Don't blame the coal bosses who flaunt their wealth. It's the system that allowed them to grow like monsters.
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