Beijing will hold the 2008 summer Olympics, for which Beijing has come up with the slogan, the “green” Olympics. The “green” Olympics is China’s attempt to achieve an environmentally friendly Olympics by trying to improve environmental protection and reduce its increasing pollution. However, the severity of desertification and sandstorms is increasing in China, and may pose a challenge to the “green” vision.
Beijing’s Xiao Kang magazine reported that coinciding with the opening of China’s sixth Annual Environmental Protection Conference on April 17, 2006, was the most severe sandstorm in the history of communist China. In one night, 300,000 tons of sand dropped on Beijing and shocked even sandstorm-hardened Beijing residents. CCP number 2, Wen Jiabao, who joined the Environmental Protection Conference, expressed his concern at the severity of the sandstorm.
On this issue, He Ping, president of the International Fund for China’s Environment (IFCE), said, “This is a signal that the environment is at breaking point after over 20 years of high speed economic development. The situation has steadily grown to this point and must now be managed.”
