Opinion

Getting a grip on dioxin

(China Daily)
Updated: 2010-11-11 16:17

Finally, something might be done about dioxin in the environment. The joint decision by nine central-government agencies to deal with the fatally toxic chemical is a long overdue initiative to plug a dangerous loophole in our country's pollution prevention program.

Dubbed "the most poisonous of all poisons on earth," dioxin was identified in 1997 as a grade-A cancer-inducing agent in humans by the International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC), part of the World Health Organization. Given its unrivalled toxicity and the fact that human activities are almost the sole cause of its existence, dioxin control has been an essential part of environmental concerns internationally. China, however, has been a shameful exception.

The roadmap and timetable proposed by the nine institutions represent the first serious attempt by the government to control dioxin. Better late than never.

There are reportedly more than 10,000 firms in 17 main industries releasing dioxin in this country, involving, but not limited to, the chemical and metallurgical industries, garbage incineration, papermaking and pesticide production. However, scientific data about dioxin release and contamination remain extremely scarce.

The People's Republic of China National Implementation Plan for the Stockholm Convention on Persistent Organic Pollutants, approved by the State Council in 2004, acknowledged that China is one of the major dioxin releasing countries in the world, but our knowledge about the extent of its release and contamination remains limited.

However, the implementation plan revealed that we do not have appropriate standards and criteria for dioxin in such commodities as foods, fodder, and mechanical and electrical products. For one thing, in spite of dioxin's known harmful potential, it has not been a part of the environmental-impact appraisal regime required for all construction projects.

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If the rather general assumption that 90 percent of dioxin in the atmospheric environment derives from the incineration of urban and industrial waste is accurate, we can congratulate ourselves for not being completely helpless, as urban consumer waste incineration turns out to be the sole area where we have seen attempts at monitoring and examination.

The nine-department decision to incorporate dioxin monitoring in compulsory environmental-impact assessments is a remarkable step forward. And, the idea to make waste-incinerating facilities regularly publish pollutant release information may be a sensible way to ease public concerns about the safety of garbage incineration.

Dioxin control is an imperative task facing all areas and all industries. But the current program covers only such "key" areas as the Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei region, as well as the Yangtze and Pearl River deltas and a few "key" industries.

We need blanket rules that amount to a complete safety network against the harmful substance.