Lesson 12: Ecological History of Asia – Colonialism through the Modern Industrial Era

Amy DurayEVPP 490 003

March 17, 2010

Colonialism

• China and Korea react to European and American imperial efforts by withdrawing.

• Japan instead adopts the ideology and expansionist policies of the westerners, and becomes itself a colonial power, invading the Korean Peninsula and the Island of Formosa (Taiwan).

• SE Asia. A time of uninterrupted growth, globalization and major exploitation of the natural resources. Plantation economies were the dominant economies of the region.

Ecological Impacts of Colonialism

• Rapid population growth and increasing urbanization.

• Rapid spread of manufacturing and mechanization of previously labor-intensive activities (farming, mining, transportation)

• Increasing pollution and biodiversity loss

China’s Modern History

• Famine, Human displacement, and Agricultural degradation during inter-war years

• Mao’s Revolution• “Great Leap Forward” – 1948 and the

subsequent doubling of agricultural irrigation from 1950-1976.

• Net impact: increasing degradation of ecosystems for increasing food production

Korea and Japan

• Japan and occupied state• Korean War (1950-1953)• Intense industrialization, often concentrated

in small economic zones (Japanese kombinatos)

• Reliance on external natural resources to fuel economic growth

Southeast Asia

• Continues economies based largely upon the export of natural resources and plantation farming

• Increasing population growth and the rise of megacities

Land Use and Degradation (1 of 2)

• Heavy Metal Soil Contamination in Japan– Copper contamination in rice fields ca. 1900 in

local areas adjacent to mines– Cadmium contamination of rice fields ca. 1950

• Soil Erosion – The Loess Plateau– Fragile soils - originally forested, but converted to

agricultural uses more than 3000 years ago– Agriculture causes >2.2 Billion tons of soil loss

each year

Land Use and Degradation (2 of 2)

• Erosion in the Phillipines– Cash cropping in Luzon under Spanish Colonial

period, continued during U.S. tenancy– Remote island peasants migrated upland and

cleared lands for subsistence use when population growth and plantations took hold in coastal areas

– Agroforestry seemed to arrest some soil erosion in 1970s, but resumed as timber is increasingly harvested for trade in later decades.

Water Scarcity and Quality (1 of 2)

• Ashio Copper Mine, Japan– Watarase River, Tochigi Prefecture– Mine tailings contaminate the river– Sulphuric acid rain contaminates local waters

• Minamata Bay, Japan– Mercury contamination as a result of manufacturing

and waste dumping– Fish contamination and “cat-dancing disease”– More than 100 people died during the three decades

it took to stop the pollution

Water Scarcity and Quality (2 of 2)

• Three Gorges Dam– Suggested as early

as 1919– Construction began

in 1992– Flooded 2008– Seismic Risks– Landslides force

evacuation of additional 300000 residents

http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2010/jan/22/wave-tidal-hydropower-water

Air Quality and Transboundary Haze

• Indonesian Forest Fires, 1982-1983; 1997-1998; 2006– High PM10 air pollution events over prolonged

periods– Potential ENSO contribution– Peat bogs continue to burn for years below the

surface, contributing to continuing pollution

TOMS Satellite image from 1997

Particulate matter readings From satellite during 2006Fires.

Next time

• Country reports