Press conference: Air quality during the Games

Beijing Radio

Mr. Steiner, I have three questions. First, in your presentation, you mentioned you visited many places in Beijing, you took the underground, you went to the monitoring stations, besides these state-of-the-art equipments which impressed you, what other incidents, what stories have impressed you most? Second question is, you've known situations around the world. London, Paris, Berlin are cities well known. At the development level of Beijing, what is the environment like in these cities, and what environmental improvement efforts have these cities made. Thirdly, Beijing aims to become a livable city. Are you confident that Beijing will become a very livable city in the future?

Achim Steiner

Thank you very much for your question. I think beyond the level of investment in technology and also mechanism to manage the environmental quality, what has impressed me most is the level of professional commitment that I have come across in the people who have actually been working for the last seven years to try to deliver the kinds of commitments that you see here. Let me give you a couple of examples. Mr. Du himself, I learned this morning, before joined the Environmental Protection Bureau in Beijing, he's a staff from the office for public complaints. He knows very well what some of the complaints are that people have about environmental air quality. Mr. Shi, director general of the Environmental Protection Bureau someone has been working for the last 30 years on these issues. These individuals having been working day and night in the last few years to do something that I would say probably no other city has ever accomplished in such a short period of time. And it's the level of professionalism and the level of personal commitment that has struck me as perhaps the most unusual phenomenon when you meet government officials who are working on these issues. I have, not for the first time, spent time in Beijing. But I have never quite sensed the intensity that I saw during the last few days. And the same is true when I visited the Public Transport Corporation I was in the control room with a normal monitors of the public transport and she has pride in the new technology that has been tested in the bus fleet in Beijing.

Another interesting thing I have never come across before is, the vehicle for environmental pollution monitoring, a mobile unit. In many countries, we have the police on the roadside having a radar, trying to catch fast drivers. Here in Beijing, there are a number of environmental supervision units that actually do monitoring pollution on the roadside with the camera, and will stop the vehicles that are polluting beyond the permissible levels. So this is just a couple of examples of where I think the boundaries have been pushed very far, but perhaps the most important thing is, the sheer interest that exists inside the institution to achieve those. If you look at cities worldwide, you know that every city has its strength and its weaknesses. There is no city in the world that is without problems, whether it's a developed or a developing country. We also have to realize that for the first time, last year, more than half of the world's population now lives in the cities. Managing urban environment, managing urban mobility, managing the footprint of the cities on their environment, is a major challenge of our times. Therefore, the changes that are currently being experimented here in Beijing are producing lessons well beyond the city limits of Beijing and even China. I think there will be failures. In cities around the world, we have seen major failures. There are cities that only began massively to be expanded in the last 25 years. And I'm stunned that urban planners produce cities where 20 years later, traffic has become nothing but a log jam. New cities, there are cities that are built not for people and not for the citizens to live there, but for the convenience of either motor ways or transport systems. The level of green spaces that are being lost in many developing countries at the moment is another tragedy that I believe generation in the future would spend a lot of money to recover from.

But you asked the question about whether Beijing will be a livable city in the future. I think everyone who would have been here in 1998 to take one year and comes to Beijing in 2008 can not but say that the city of Beijing has already become more livable. But my wish is, whether it's environmental pollution, public transport, green spaces, the air quality for the citizens of Beijing will have to improve to make it a truly livable city in the long term. Because to be here for a few days is no great achievement, to live here, to bring up your children, and see them grow up healthily, I think it's every Beijing citizen's dream. In that sense, I think the Environmental Protection Bureau the government authorities will still see a lot of public interest and public pressure to do more in the future.

Satinder Bindra

Thank you very much for the question. We'll take more, and if I could ask you to please identify yourself as well.

Canadian reporter

Mr. Steiner, you said early in your address that, at the moment Beijing was struggling to keep within the range committed for the quality of the life for the athletes. Can you say what that is in meteorological term that if the present condition stay like this, if they don't have a little bit of luck, and have some wind and rain, will that threaten any of the outdoor events?

Achim Steiner

Thank you, I can answer that in fairly straightforward terms. As you know, there are a number of standards have been developed. You've heard a lot of those recent days. At the moment, the International Olympic Committee, BOCOG, and the whole Olympic movement are clearly watching the numbers. As you know, there have been a lot of talks about WHO guide lines, about national standards. At the moment, air level quality or the quality of the air and pollution levels have been increasing in the last 3 or 4 days. But I also like to stabilize, and at this moment of time, the IOC is in charge of determining at what point and event may have to either be postponed or to shifted. That circumstance has not yet arisen according to the data and we can later on turn to Mr. Du also and ask for the latest readings. But I think right now, let me clarify that the WHO guide lines that are often referred to need to be looked at from two points of view. At the time of candidacy of the city of Beijing, the WHO guide lines were used as a base line for determining China's and Beijing's commitment in terms of what they had to achieve. Some of the national standards were in fact higher, tighter than the WHO at the time. In 2005, the WHO revised the guide lines, and this is a little bit technical, those guide lines however have 3 intermediate steps particular for developing economies to move towards the optimal air quality conditions. To all in tense and purposes, the data is available to me right now indicates that in terms of national standards and WHO guide lines, in terms of the intermediate step for developing nation, is currently met by the condition that are in place for athletes here. But let me also just perhaps on this air pollution issue say, I think any athlete should not been be blamed for being concerned about this issue. You come here, you want to win the gold medal, this is the one day perhaps you will perform better than ever. Obviously, you want the ideal condition. But ladies and gentlemen, the truth is across the world, the environment is becoming a challenge for us as human beings. I'd like to remind you that air pollution is not an issue unique to Beijing. In fact, if you go back in the history of the Olympic events, air pollution has been a constant companion. And some of you maybe even surprised if you go back to Los Angeles, according to EPA data at the time, actually all days of the events of the Olympics were by air monitoring quality data, considered to be either moderate or very unhealthy. We have learned a lot of about air pollution, we are learning a lot about the guide lines that should be put in place. I think we need to keep into perspective here that yes, there could be particularly for sensitive groups, a moment in time, when level of air quality may see the point when the Olympic committee will determine based on scientific data that it has to act. Up to now, my understanding is that reason is not a reason.

Aroundtherings.com

Two questions. One is about London. What would you say London can learn for Beijing's experience of environmental improvements? What would you say are London's current weaknesses in areas in which it needs to improve?

Achim Steiner

I think it's difficult right now to determine at this point where the environmental improvements are most likely to be achieved, where they can be pushed forward, and what lessons can be learned from Beijing. Let us, in a sense, bring these Games to conclusion and then look at what has actually worked. We have an enormous amount of technology on this compass, is this the way to go forward, which one is good, which one needs to improve, I think one area certainly where not only London, but in fact every European nation, every industrialized nation is being challenged is on two fronts. I think London could become a platform for demonstrating the kind of cutting edge ambition with technology improvement, renewable energy. And it is an area where UK is now putting a lot of political attention and we hope that renewable energy, technology could receive the kind of boost that will perhaps come out of the Beijing Olympics for China. Energy efficiency. And I think mobility again, London is also the city that has been struggling with transport, with trying to balance the interest of individual mobility with public transport mobility. What is the next generation beyond or not beyond in a sense of replacing, but building on the congestion charge experience that the Olympic Games provide a visionary impulse to public mobility questions which are universal to every capital city. And I think what will ultimately make a Green Games being incredible is that you have a plan in place. What impresses us in the UNEP is that while initially having made a very strong pitch for the Green Olympic Games, BOCOG then realized that it's a lot of work actually to make this more than just a pledge. And therefore a lot of work went into putting the targets and the commitment into place with numbers and with data that can support them. I would love to see London, as an industrialized capital city, to put a plan on the table that would allow the citizens of London, but also the world Olympic movement to be part of seeing a systematic approach towards meeting those targets. Certainly for us, this has been the most systematic effort that we are aware of the Olympic host city to put itself out for assessment by having put these targets in place.

VOA

Just now, Mr. Steiner just mentioned that the vehicles in Beijing increased from 100 million to 300 million. This has not only caused pressure to public transportation, it will also cause a lot of air pollution. In reducing the air pollution, Beijing has adopted a series of measures. In the further development of the city, the decision makers of Beijing realized that fact that as a very densely polluted city, maybe it is not necessary that they increase the number of cars in the city in such a rapid manner. Actually Beijing citizens are very satisfied with some of the policies and measures they are taking now, the categories the number of vehicles in the day.

Du Shaozhong

I am very honored to be here at the media briefing. While I am supposed to attend with Mr. Steiner just to accompany Mr. Steiner. I had thought that Mr. Steiner will be the main spokesperson. But since your question is quite relevant to the development of the city, and the development of vehicle pollutions. We are talking about pollution as a global challenge. Everyone has to think what we need to resolve this very difficult issue. One way is that we limit the development, the other is to control pollution while developing. For Beijing, we want to develop public transportation and prioritize the public transportation and at the same time, we want to use other measures to control pollution, we also have to mobilize the whole nation to raise the awareness and pay attention to this issue.

I agree with Mr. Steiner in his speech. We want to increase people's comfortableness when developing the city. Everyone has the right to enjoy the life brought by the wealth. I would like to encourage people to own whatever they want to. However, at the same time, we have to conduct measures to deal with pollution.

As I told you, one of the major pollution reduction measures is, we put the public transportation as our priority. We also want to control implemental pollution to increase the quality of fuel so that the level of pollution can be reduced. Another measure is to have a strict inspection to the existing vehicles. We are facing out some old and out dated vehicles. For example, Mr. Steiner has mentioned that the public transportation pubic buses, actually 20,453 public buses in Beijing has already reached the standard, which is a percent of 97.8%. The series of policies can guarantee that while the number of vehicles increased by more than 100% on the basis of that in 1998. However, pollutants are dropping. These are the current measures we are taking. Of course we don't oppose the ideal of learning the state of the art technology from other parts of the world.

SBS, Australia

A question for Mr. Du. Could you please confirm how many trees have been planted after Beijing won the bid of the Games in 2001. Also how many trees are expected to be planted in the coming years? Is it an ongoing plan to keep on planting trees in Beijing to keep the green in Beijing? Given there are 7,000 building sites in Beijing under construction, to keep the dust down that the ongoing pace of development in Beijing that some trees that planted might be lost in he future years with the 10% economic growth in Beijing. Do some of those threes may be lost in the future?

Du Shaozhong

Well the greening of the city is a long-term object, before the Olympics, we planted many trees. In the future we are going to plant more. Secondly, as for the construction in Beijing, this is a very important aspect of the air pollution control of the city. At the so called 100 per cent dust control in the buildings of the construction sites. There are five of them. During the games, we have a overall plan for the construction of the games.

Sarinder Bindra

Sorry our time is limited. Later I would like to take your questions on the side. Mr. Steiner has a very important announcement to make. I will let him get on it.

Achim Steiner

Thank you very much. Ladies and gentlemen, specially for our friends in China, but I think also for sports fans around the world, there is something this morning that makes me fill me particularly with joy and pride. Whenever we talked about the environment, we always focus on the science, the empirical evidence and sometimes failures of our society to deal with the issues. But the inspiration to deal with the environment comes not through document, report and scientific analysis, but from individuals that can inspire. We are very proud to announce that this morning, Yao Ming, the world famous basketball player has kindly agreed to become the first environmental champion. This is an honor for the work we do. It is a tremendous boost for people across China, across the world that Yao Ming has given his commitment to join us and many of the people who are trying to take environment sustainability forward.

This is a moral boost and if you want to take the inspiration, the message beyond the conference room and beyond the technical domain into our communities.

We approached him because we believe both as an individual and as a person but also with his outlook and the charisma that he brings, he can add to the momentum that is now not only driving the Olympic events around issues of environment and environment responsibility.

Ladies and gentlemen, we live in a time where climate change and global warming and the deterioration have reached crisis point. People like Yao Ming become part of the global movement to inspire people. I'm very grateful for him to be the first environmental champion. Others will join soon. We are in discussion with leaders and individuals like him across the world to form another team in the global environment community to take this issue forward.

He has given a speech that is available to you in a moment. Particular to our Chinese journalists. I would like to say we think this is a boost to people and everybody who care about the environment in China. We need people to take responsibility, this is one good news that I would like to share with you this morning.

Sarinder Bindra

We do have statements from him. It's a statement that he has put out and I would like to share with you. Right there at the back, there are the copies in both Chinese and English, so please do reach out for one.

Thank you very much. You've been very engaging, and thank you so much for coming. I know you all have a very late night last night. Thanks again.

Wang Hui

As there is another press conference, jointly organized by IOC and BOCOG, we have to call this to an end. Thank you very much for coming.