“On this day, 22 August 1943, the Statesman magazine published this photograph of starving people during the Bengal famine in British colonial India.
The governor of Bengal had ordered rice across much of Bengal to be removed or destroyed in 1942 to prevent it getting into enemy hands, and they confiscated 46,000 boats from local people, devastating the fishing industry. Authorities then began diverting food from rural areas, where there were already shortages, to people deemed a "priority", namely wealthier and better educated people, and those working in war industries and the civil service. Flooding damaged farmland, putting food supplies at risk, however Winston Churchill's government did not act on these warnings.
When the famine began, instead of providing relief, the government forbade the colony from using its own financial reserves or ships to import food, and instead continued to export thousands of tonnes of rice for Europeans, and put excess food from elsewhere in the British Empire into storage.
In all, 2 to 4 million people died, in what most historians consider an entirely man-made famine. India had previously suffered much bigger reductions in food supply without mass deaths, for example in 1873-4. But Churchill was a white supremacist who cared nothing for the local population. He believed that "the starvation of anyhow underfed Bengalis is less serious than that of sturdy Greeks", and during the famine he proudly exclaimed "I hate Indians. They are a beastly people with a beastly religion." Source: Working Class History
Navdeep Singh
The rate of urbanization in India was 11% in 1900. By 1960. It reached a measly 17%. It took another 60 (!) years for it double, to about 35% in 2020. There are projections now that it may FINALLY reach 50% by 2050. Keep in mind, much of the urban population resides in massive, grotesque slums and plagued by unemployment rates of 30-50%. This is still preferable to living in the countryside, trying to eke out a miserable living as a peasant or small farmer. Trump in his new trade deal proposal tried to ram the dumping of US agricultural products in India. Any Indian PM with even a modicum of sanity would denounce this, outright. Because it would mean abject poverty and starvation for the farmers.
About the only good thing one can say about the Indian government since Independence is that the massive, monstrous famines that plagued the country since the dawn of British Rule went away, for good. Indeed, the fist Bengali famine in 1770 killed 10 million (or 33% of the population). The famines persisted to such an extent that for decades, the Indian population to numbers remained stagnant in the 19th and early 20th centuries.
Let us compare the urbanization of India with the Urbanization of China. By 1980, it was actually lower than India, at about 18%. Today, its stands at 67%., and the plan is to increase it to 75-80% by 2035.
Here are the explicit Chinese policies outlined to make such further urban transformations happen, as delineated from their official policy papers—— a question that gets to the heart of China's current development strategy. The future goals and their intrinsic link to environmentally sound, green development are outlined in key policy documents, most importantly the 20th National Congress Report and the broader vision for their Project 2035.
Key Qualitative Goals
* Hukou Reform: Granting urban *hukou* (household registration) to more migrant populations. This is crucial, as it provides full access to public services (education, healthcare) for the hundreds of millions who already live in cities but are not fully integrated. The goal is to break down the dual structure between urban and rural areas.
* Development of City Clusters and Metropolitan Regions: Intensifying development in major clusters like the Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei region, the Yangtze River Delta, and the Greater Bay Area (Guangzhou-Shenzhen-Hong Kong). This promotes efficient resource use and economic synergy.
* Urban Renewal: Shifting from building new cities on empty land to renovating and upgrading existing urban stock—improving old neighborhoods, sewage systems, and transportation networks.
* People-Centered Urbanization: Creating more liveable, resilient, and smart cities that improve the quality of life for residents.
The Integral Link to Green and Environmentally Sound Development
This quality-focused urbanization model is inseparable from the goal of green development. They are two sides of the same coin in China's new development philosophy. High-quality urbanization is, by definition, green urbanization.
Here’s how they are explicitly connected:
1. Compact, Efficient Urban Forms (The Antidote to Sprawl):
* Goal: Promoting dense, walkable cities connected by public transit reduces energy consumption per capita compared to low-density, car-dependent suburban sprawl.
* Policy Link: Developing city clusters concentrates economic activity and population in efficient zones, preserving ecological spaces, farmland, and biodiversity between them.
2. Green Building and Infrastructure:
* Goal: Mandating and incentivizing green building standards for all new construction and renovations. This includes energy-efficient designs, use of sustainable materials, and better insulation.
* Policy Link: The "sponge city" initiative is a perfect example—using permeable surfaces, green roofs, and wetlands to absorb stormwater, reducing flooding and recharging aquifers.
3. Decarbonizing Urban Systems:
* Goal: The dual carbon goals (peak carbon by 2030, carbon neutrality by 2060) are directly driven by urban policy.
* Policy Link: Electrifying public transportation (buses, metro systems), promoting New Energy Vehicles (NEVs) with widespread charging infrastructure, and transitioning urban heating and power systems from coal to natural gas and renewables.
4. Circular Economy and Waste Management:
* Goal: Cities are engines of consumption and waste. Green urbanization requires building sophisticated systems for sorting, recycling, and treating municipal solid waste.
* Policy Link: Major cities are implementing strict waste sorting regulations and investing in waste-to-energy plants to reduce landfill use and pollution.
5. Ecological Civilization Integration:
* Goal: The concept of "Ecological Civilization" is now a core principle. This means cities are no longer seen as separate from nature but must integrate with it.
* Policy Link: This involves creating extensive green spaces, urban parks, and ecological corridors within cities to improve air quality, provide recreation, and support urban biodiversity.
SUMMARY: The intrinsic link is clear: environmentally sound development is the essential method for achieving this new quality of urbanization. You cannot have a "high-quality" city in the 21st century that is polluted, congested, wasteful, and vulnerable to climate change. Therefore, green development is not a separate add-on; it is the fundamental framework through which all future urban growth and renewal is being planned and executed. The success of one is now directly tied to the success of the other.
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