Sustainability

Arizona State University, in partnership with the China-U.S. Center for Sustainable Development, provides training programs in sustainability and sustainable land use management to Chinese Government officials from the Ministry of Land and Resources (MLR). During fall 2004 ASU hosted and trained two cohorts of 40-45 Chinese officials each. Liu Tianzeng, Director General for the Cultivated Land Protection Department of China’s MLR led the September 2004 delegation, which included senior representatives from the Ministry of Land and Resources, the National Reform and Development Commission, Tibet, Inner Mongolia, the Xinjiang Uigur Autonomous Region, the City of Tianjin, and Shandong, Liaoning, Jiangxi, Guizhou and Jiangxi Provinces. The October 2004 delegation was led by Mr. Fan Zhiquan, Director General for the Department of Cadastral Management of China’s Ministry of Land and Resources. The group included senior representatives from the Ministry of Land and Resources and provincial and local officials from Anhui, Fujian, Hebei, Heilongjiang, Henan, Hunan, Jiangsu, Jilin, Shaanxi, Shandong and Shannxi provinces and the Beijing Housing Administration.

The curriculum includes structured discussions on the application of sustainability research to the Chinese context, two-way transfer of knowledge, hands-on learning, and peer learning among the Chinese participants. The complete program curriculum focuses on the importance of planning to protect water and air quality, agricultural and ecologically sensitive lands, the sustainable design of urban and rural landscapes and the reduction of greenhouse gas emissions. The ASU portion of the program combines classroom presentations, group discussion and project site visits led by government professionals and private sector experts in collaboration with ASU faculty in areas including desert land and water use, corporate water management, urban green space and land use planning, urban heat island, and rapid urbanization.

The China-U.S. Center for Sustainable Development was founded in April 1999 on the occasion of China Premier Zhu Rongji's visit to Washington, D.C. for the U.S. - China Joint Commission on Science and Technology. The China Secretariat is the Administrative Center for China's Agenda 21, responsible to the Ministry of Science and Technology. The U.S. Secretariat is the International Sustainable Development Foundation, a 501 (c) (3) non-profit organization.

Participation in the training program has provided ASU researchers and administrators with exceptional access to government officials responsible for studying and implementing policies related to urbanization in China. For instance, Director General Fan, leader of the October 2004 training cohort, oversees the Chinese government's most advanced remote sensing unit addressing land use issues. In January 2005, co-investigator Phil Christensen met with Fan and his staff in Beijing to further their collaborative ties comparing U.S. and Chinese cities, and to arrange for two MLR technicians to spend several months at ASU learning advanced remote sensing techniques. ASU will continue to build on these relationships to create an initiative in remote sensing of Asian cities based in the newly founded ASU International Institute for Sustainability.

In addition to the ongoing research on environmental and sustainability issues led by ASU professors in China—including Professors Andrew Smith, James Elser, Jon Harrison (School of Life Sciences), Michael Kuby (Geography)—Professor Jianguo Wu recently received a grant, in partnership with the Chinese Academy of Sciences Institute of Botany, for US$ 1.2 million from Chinese Academy of Sciences and National Science Foundation of China to establish the world largest field manipulative experiment on biodiversity and ecosystem functioning in Inner Mongolia Grassland. This is the first step a larger planned project for developing an international collaborative project on biodiversity and ecosystem functioning between ASU and China.