Concept Caching: Housing in Shanghai, China

From our Concept Caching image cache that hopes to promote student spatial awareness by relating specific features on the Earth’s surface with their visual character and GPS coordinates. Through the site photographs and GPS coordinates demonstrate core concepts in geography.  Images are “cached” for viewing by core concept and by region.  Images are certainly useful for introducing visual content to students in all Geography classes.

In the post Geography Directions: Census of 37% of the World, India and China are conducting their own censuses of their own populations.  Censuses are important for countries as they provide demographic information about their people, information for political and regulatory purposes, and data for economic forecasting.  What is more, counting people helps a country assess the needs of its infrastructure and services.  In China, as well as in India, one of the challenges of keeping up with such large populations is the provision of housing. These two images reveal the different contexts and difficulties of urban housing: historical preservation or high-density modernization; and suburban sprawl or agricultural land use.

Geography Directions: Census of 37% of the World

From our Geography Directions site reviewing Wiley-Blackwell’s Geography Compass review journal covering the entire discipline.  Keep up with cutting edge academic geography.  These articles may be useful for introducing students to the discipline or may be appropriate for upper division Geography classes.

Learning that China has recently completed its 2010 census of 1.3 million people and that India is in the midst of preparation for its February 2011 census of 1.2 billion people, I wanted to find out more about how one would go about counting what is in total, 37% of the world’s population. Keen to learn how this may be done, I read Len Cook’s article “The quality and qualities of population statistics, and the place of the census” in the journal “Area”. The article describes how population counts are the key to official statistical systems and the yardstick for many commercial and research surveys and analyses. In addition, the article describes how statistical offices around the world face an extensive range of challenges when counting their population, particularly because population flows have become much freer and the structure of families continue to evolve. Considering these issues, the article reviews how population counts have and will evolve over time in the UK and other countries.

In China , the decennial population Census was held between November 1 – 10, using an army of 6 million enumerators across the country. However, China has had special difficulties to overcome . Firstly, because of millions of illegal migrants, the so called “floating population”, and secondly because of the unauthorised births which were previously concealed due to the government’s stringent population policy. Some light should also be shed on the countrys’ skewed sex ratio at birth due to the preference for male offspring. There are officially about 120 male births to every 100 female instead of the global norm of 105. The official estimate of the sex ratio of the country’s 0- to-4 age group in 2008 was 123 males per 100 females.

The results of the census counts in China and India will be released at almost the same time in 2011 with India releasing their figures at the end of March and China at the end of April. Depending on the results a world population of 7 billion may be official by early next year.

To view the original article please visit the Geography Directions Blog.

A Geography of the Periodic Table of Elements

I remember staring at a large weathered chart of the Periodic Table of Elements that hung on the wall in my chemistry classes. So many elements, so little to do with geography. And then there were those two rows at the bottom that didn’t fit nicely into the chart. We never studied those elements, so what did they matter? 

Fast forward 20 years and I have become a techno-geek. My cell phone (like many of yours) is also my GPS, radio, camera, navigation system, email and internet browser. I love my LCD TV and blu ray-player (that doubles as a PS3). I have not one, but two hybrid cars. And without top row of misfit elements (highlighted in orange), none of these gadgets would be possible.

These misfit elements are collectively referred to as rare earth elements (REEs), not because as the name mistakenly implies, they are rare in nature, but because they are typically not found in large quantities, thus making their mining very expensive. But they are a key ingredient in most electronic devices and batteries – a typical hybrid car has roughly a kilogram of REEs in its batteries. Ok, on to the geography.

Top Five countries supplying US REEs (source: USGS)

Country	% of US imports
China	90.2
France	3.1
Japan	2.2
Russia	1.4
Austria	0.8

China is the largest producer of REEs, accounting roughly 95-97% of the world’s production. From a geopolitical perspective, this puts them at a great advantage – countries are dependent on China for REEs. Moreover, China has recently reduced export quotas of REEs by nearly 75% and is threatening to reduce these quotas by another 30%. The U.S. imports over 90% of its REEs from China. This should result in a price increase for many electronic goods that we often take for granted. While some manufacturers are looking for substitutes for REEs for the production of goods (e.g. Toyota and hybrid cars), the US may have stumbled upon a proverbial jackpot in Afghanistan. In Helmand Province, in southern Afghanistan, government officials announced there are unexplored mineral deposits valued at nearly $1 trillion, of which almost 6% are REEs. This represents an incredible amount of REEs and would no doubt give Afghanistan a setting at the global resource table. Could Afghanistan meet the US and the rest of the world’s demand for REEs? How would China react if this is the case? What are some implications for economic development in Afghanistan? These are but a few questions students of political geography would find interesting.

Concept Caching: Shennong River, China

From our Concept Caching image cache that hopes to promote student spatial awareness by relating specific features on the Earth’s surface with their visual character and GPS coordinates. Through the site photographs and GPS coordinates demonstrate core concepts in geography.  Images are “cached” for viewing by core concept and by region.  Images are certainly useful for introducing visual content to students in all Geography classes.

The Shennong River is one of the tributaries to the Yangtze River in China. It is a sleepy river valley with farm houses nestled along the valley floor and its surrounding mountains. Farmers in this community must terrace the surrounding hills to have sufficient acreage to cultivate. This means laborious work by hand, bringing buckets of water up and down the mountains every day to make sure their precious crops are sustained.

This image submitted by Vicki Drake offers a picturesque visualization for some of the rural landscapes of the Chinese interior.  The Shennong River, or Shen Nong Stream, is one of the tributaries to the Yangtze River just miles upriver from the Three Gorges Dam.  The Shennong valley blends from agricultural landscape to geological landscape as its stream grade cuts one of the lesser gorges leading to the Yangtze in this high relief area.  The image can suggest the “sleepy” quality of the area, but can also foster recognition of the potential for natural disasters and difficulty in providing emergency services in such relatively remote, but populated area, as mentioned in the post Chinese Environmental Problems and the Potential for Change.

Chinese Environmental Problems and the Potential for Change

Over the past month there has been much in the news about catastrophic natural disasters and anthropogenic environmental woes plaguing the vast Chinese landscape.  This is certainly not “news” for its novel or exceptional nature.  Yet, the extent of these events does raise questions about the future of China’s environment and of the choices that its government will make to secure or squander that future.

Some of the biggest news stories focused on the July 16^th oil spill in Dalian.  Two oil pipelines ruptured and exploded leaking thousands of barrels of oil into the sea near this northernmost warm water seaport in the Yellow Sea.  In the days that followed, there were many reports questioning the Chinese government’s account of the size of the spill and documenting the improvised nature of the “grim task” that was its clean-up.  This event showed the lack of preparedness in mitigating or responding to such a disaster.

Long before the oil spill, the southwestern countryside had been experiencing a record drought dating back to October of 2009.  The drought was then ended by heavy rains that touched off landslides and swelled the waters of the Yangtze River and tested the limits of the Three Gorges Dam.  Days later, reports followed of the worst flood in a decade along the Yangtze that killed at least 273 people as of July 22^nd.  More rains and deadly landslides hit the north-central county of Zhouqu killing 127 people in early August.  And more rain is forecast for the area, thwarting clean-up, rescue and aid efforts.  Such crises require resources and planning to respond to such national emergencies in providing for citizens’ basic needs.

Amid such devastation, one of the most interesting discussions has focused on the power of these events and on assessing their role in affecting the Chinese governments’ current policy toward its environment, its people, and its economic livelihood.  A Reuters blog speculates if this is China’s “Minamata moment”, referencing Japan’s Minamata Bay long plagued by industrial pollution that poisoned large numbers of local fisherman and their children with high levels of mercury.  The “moment” led the Japanese government in the 1970s to prioritize pollution reforms.  A staff writer for the Natural Resources Defense Council attempts to provide some answer to the speculation by highlighting two lessons learned from these and other events.  First, “You can only solve the problems you know about,” referring to the slow reporting of industrial-related accidents.  Second, “Social stability comes from fixing the problem,” recognizing that social stability is ultimately one of Chinese national priorities and to best secure that priority, China needs to find big picture solutions for these types of problems.  A writer from the Atlantic introduces yet another possibility.  The article is skeptical of recent events’ role in bringing about a largely transformative moment, instead seeing it as a “recalibration” that will attempt to find a new balance between status quo economic interests and the need for more responsive environmental needs.

Discussion Questions:

1. Pick one or more of the recent Chinese environmental problems mentioned in any of the articles.  What do you think should be expected of the government in mitigating and/or responding to such an event or events?
2. Think about the vast scale of the Chinese national landscape.  What challenges do you think are inherent in dealing with the diverse and changing environments in this area?  Can you make any suggestions for such a scale dilemma?
3. What do you think that these events will mean for the future of the Chinese environment and its people?  How do you think the Chinese government will weigh the interests of its industries and economy against that of its peoples’ and lands’ well-being?