{"id":32972,"date":"2015-06-17T13:18:00","date_gmt":"2015-06-17T13:18:00","guid":{"rendered":""},"modified":"2020-11-10T13:50:12","modified_gmt":"2020-11-10T13:50:12","slug":"7972-growing-pains-for-china-s-new-environmental-courts","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dialogue.earth\/en\/pollution\/7972-growing-pains-for-china-s-new-environmental-courts\/","title":{"rendered":"Growing pains for China’s new environmental courts"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n
\n
China in recent years has set up hundreds<\/a> of new environmental courts as part of institutional reforms that aim to encourage greener growth and curb pollution, but the country will have to speed up training and recruitment to ensure judges have the necessary expertise.<\/p>\n

The Supreme People\u2019s Court recently launched a national \u2018environment and resources court\u2019, and last month announced the founding of a training centre for judges.<\/p>\n

The moves are aimed to bring more professionalism to handling of pollution cases, and come amid rapid growth in the number of environmental courts, which according to the Supreme People\u2019s Court now number at least 370 throughout the country.<\/p>\n

Although the number of cases being heard is still relatively low as new environmental laws only start to take effect, figures are expected to rise sharply within the next three years.<\/p>\n

Prior to 2014 there had been a total of approximately 100 public interest environmental cases heard nationwide, but during last year alone, more than 100 were heard.<\/p>\n

\u201cBut that\u2019s still not a lot,\u201d says Lin Yanmei, associate professor at Vermont Law School.<\/p>\n

More than 300 judges have now received specialist training, 18 of whom have gone on to instruct others.<\/p>\n

In addition, new training courses<\/a> in environmental law are being provided by the National Judges College and China University of Politics and Law.<\/p>\n

But the measures could take five years to meet the requirements of the new environmental courts, said Han Deqiang, deputy-secretary of the Supreme People\u2019s Court\u2019s Center for Research into Environmental and Resource Issues.<\/p>\n

In addition to having the required capacity to deal with an expected increase in cases, the reforms also bring a new set of challenges for judges, many of whom lack requisite background and technical knowledge.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s like in intellectual property cases,\u201d says Han. \u201cIt doesn\u2019t matter how high-ranking you are, if you don\u2019t know the field you can\u2019t hear the case. It\u2019s the same with environment and resource cases.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

<\/div>\n
Challenges<\/b><\/p>\n

Environmental law isn\u2019t a popular choice at universities, and only a very small number who study it go on to work in the judiciary, say experts.<\/p>\n

The ideal environmental judge has a background in science and engineering, allowing them to more easily understand the technical issues involved, says Luo Guangqian, head of China\u2019s first environmental court. But such candidates are scarce.<\/p>\n

Some areas run extensive training programmes. Shaanxi province has put 80 judges through training offered in a partnership between the EU-China Environmental Governance Programme and the Ministry of Environmental Protection.<\/p>\n

Scaling up the number of qualified and capable judges will be crucial because many have never handled an environmental case and have little idea of what\u2019s involved.<\/p>\n

Urgency is needed because \u201cwe\u2019re going to be getting a lot more of these cases soon,\u201d says Tu Daoyong, a judge at the intellectual property tribunal of the provincial high court.<\/p>\n

Judges with some experience in environmental cases face other challenges, such as maintaining independence in areas where polluting companies wield hefty political power and enjoy patronage from local officials.<\/p>\n

Because environmental cases are often complex, even the most experienced judges can sometimes be left scratching their heads.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

<\/div>\n
Pilot schemes<\/b><\/p>\n

Luo Guangqian suggests an innovative approach to hearing cases.<\/p>\n

To cite one example, a company accused of pollution could find itself receiving a \u2018pre-hearing order\u2019 to halt operations and discharge of pollutants. In the past, such an order would only have come from a government body.<\/p>\n

Allowing expert testimony as evidence is another innovation that should be applied on a wider scale, he adds. For example, an expert on soil pollution might now be called to testify on whether pollution can be cleaned up, or how much damage has been done.<\/p>\n

A court could then accept that evidence, rather than commissioning a third-party body to carry out an independent assessment, saving both time and money.<\/p>\n

An environmental court in Guiyang<\/a> in the southern Chinese province of Guizhou was one of four set up as part of trials initiated by the Supreme People\u2019s Court, and has been granted the right to \u2018innovate\u2019 in dealing with cases.<\/p>\n

The court was created in 2007 to resolve a jurisdiction dispute involving pollution in the city\u2019s main water source, and the court eventually ruled against the offending fertiliser plant, making it the first public interest case of its kind in China.<\/p>\n

However its not clear at this stage whether the Supreme People\u2019s Court will be able to expand the experience of the four trial locations to courts on a nationwide basis.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

See also: Why are China’s anti-pollution lawsuits stalling?\u00a0<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

China is scaling up its environmental courts, but there may not be enough experienced judges to hear complex pollution cases<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1281,"featured_media":58013,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[760],"tags":[],"hashtags":[],"country":[],"class_list":["post-32972","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-pollution"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\nGrowing pains for China's new environmental courts | Dialogue Earth<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"China is scaling up its environmental courts, but there may not be enough experienced judges to hear complex pollution cases\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/dialogue.earth\/en\/pollution\/7972-growing-pains-for-china-s-new-environmental-courts\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Growing pains for China's new environmental courts\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"China is scaling up its environmental courts, but there may not be enough experienced judges to hear complex pollution cases\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/dialogue.earth\/en\/pollution\/7972-growing-pains-for-china-s-new-environmental-courts\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Dialogue Earth\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2015-06-17T13:18:00+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2020-11-10T13:50:12+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/dialogue.earth\/content\/uploads\/2020\/05\/hammer-719066_640.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"640\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"480\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Chun Zhang\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/dialogue.earth\/en\/pollution\/7972-growing-pains-for-china-s-new-environmental-courts\/#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/dialogue.earth\/en\/pollution\/7972-growing-pains-for-china-s-new-environmental-courts\/\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"Chun Zhang\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/dialogue.earth\/en\/#\/schema\/person\/0e886366e2cc2ac25bd72c8926e12ae2\"},\"headline\":\"Growing pains for China’s new environmental courts\",\"datePublished\":\"2015-06-17T13:18:00+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2020-11-10T13:50:12+00:00\",\"mainEntityOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/dialogue.earth\/en\/pollution\/7972-growing-pains-for-china-s-new-environmental-courts\/\"},\"wordCount\":774,\"publisher\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/dialogue.earth\/en\/#organization\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/dialogue.earth\/en\/pollution\/7972-growing-pains-for-china-s-new-environmental-courts\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/dialogue.earth\/content\/uploads\/2020\/05\/hammer-719066_640.jpg\",\"articleSection\":[\"Pollution\"],\"inLanguage\":\"en\"},{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/dialogue.earth\/en\/pollution\/7972-growing-pains-for-china-s-new-environmental-courts\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/dialogue.earth\/en\/pollution\/7972-growing-pains-for-china-s-new-environmental-courts\/\",\"name\":\"Growing pains for China's new environmental courts | Dialogue Earth\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/dialogue.earth\/en\/#website\"},\"primaryImageOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/dialogue.earth\/en\/pollution\/7972-growing-pains-for-china-s-new-environmental-courts\/#primaryimage\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/dialogue.earth\/en\/pollution\/7972-growing-pains-for-china-s-new-environmental-courts\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/dialogue.earth\/content\/uploads\/2020\/05\/hammer-719066_640.jpg\",\"datePublished\":\"2015-06-17T13:18:00+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2020-11-10T13:50:12+00:00\",\"description\":\"China is scaling up its environmental courts, but there may not be enough experienced judges to hear complex pollution cases\",\"breadcrumb\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/dialogue.earth\/en\/pollution\/7972-growing-pains-for-china-s-new-environmental-courts\/#breadcrumb\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/dialogue.earth\/en\/pollution\/7972-growing-pains-for-china-s-new-environmental-courts\/\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/dialogue.earth\/en\/pollution\/7972-growing-pains-for-china-s-new-environmental-courts\/#primaryimage\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/dialogue.earth\/content\/uploads\/2020\/05\/hammer-719066_640.jpg\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/dialogue.earth\/content\/uploads\/2020\/05\/hammer-719066_640.jpg\",\"width\":640,\"height\":480,\"caption\":\"a gavel, china's environmental courts\"},{\"@type\":\"BreadcrumbList\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/dialogue.earth\/en\/pollution\/7972-growing-pains-for-china-s-new-environmental-courts\/#breadcrumb\",\"itemListElement\":[{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":1,\"name\":\"Home\",\"item\":\"https:\/\/dialogue.earth\/en\/\"},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":2,\"name\":\"Growing pains for China’s new environmental courts\"}]},{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/dialogue.earth\/en\/#website\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/dialogue.earth\/en\/\",\"name\":\"Dialogue Earth\",\"description\":\"Global climate and environment news\",\"publisher\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/dialogue.earth\/en\/#organization\"},\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"SearchAction\",\"target\":{\"@type\":\"EntryPoint\",\"urlTemplate\":\"https:\/\/dialogue.earth\/en\/?s={search_term_string}\"},\"query-input\":{\"@type\":\"PropertyValueSpecification\",\"valueRequired\":true,\"valueName\":\"search_term_string\"}}],\"inLanguage\":\"en\"},{\"@type\":\"Organization\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/dialogue.earth\/en\/#organization\",\"name\":\"\u5bf9\u8bdd\u5730\u7403\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/dialogue.earth\/en\/\",\"logo\":{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/dialogue.earth\/en\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/dialogue.earth\/content\/uploads\/2024\/04\/Dialogue-Earth-Symbol-Logo_Black-Text.png\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/dialogue.earth\/content\/uploads\/2024\/04\/Dialogue-Earth-Symbol-Logo_Black-Text.png\",\"width\":256,\"height\":256,\"caption\":\"\u5bf9\u8bdd\u5730\u7403\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/dialogue.earth\/en\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/\"},\"sameAs\":[\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/DialogueEarth_\",\"\",\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/DialogueEarth.English\",\"https:\/\/www.instagram.com\/dialogue.earth\/\",\"https:\/\/www.linkedin.com\/company\/dialogueearth\/\"],\"publishingPrinciples\":\"https:\/\/dialogue.earth\/en\/about\/\"},{\"@type\":\"Person\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/dialogue.earth\/en\/#\/schema\/person\/0e886366e2cc2ac25bd72c8926e12ae2\",\"name\":\"Chun Zhang\",\"description\":\"Zhang Chun is a senior researcher at China Dialogue.\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/dialogue.earth\/en\/author\/zhangchun\/\",\"sameAs\":[\"https:\/\/dialogue.earth\/en\/author\/zhangchun\/\"]}]}<\/script>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO Premium plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"Growing pains for China's new environmental courts | Dialogue Earth","description":"China is scaling up its environmental courts, but there may not be enough experienced judges to hear complex pollution cases","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/dialogue.earth\/en\/pollution\/7972-growing-pains-for-china-s-new-environmental-courts\/","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"Growing pains for China's new environmental courts","og_description":"China is scaling up its environmental courts, but there may not be enough experienced judges to hear complex pollution cases","og_url":"https:\/\/dialogue.earth\/en\/pollution\/7972-growing-pains-for-china-s-new-environmental-courts\/","og_site_name":"Dialogue Earth","article_published_time":"2015-06-17T13:18:00+00:00","article_modified_time":"2020-11-10T13:50:12+00:00","og_image":[{"width":640,"height":480,"url":"https:\/\/dialogue.earth\/content\/uploads\/2020\/05\/hammer-719066_640.jpg","type":"image\/jpeg"}],"author":"Chun Zhang","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"Article","@id":"https:\/\/dialogue.earth\/en\/pollution\/7972-growing-pains-for-china-s-new-environmental-courts\/#article","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/dialogue.earth\/en\/pollution\/7972-growing-pains-for-china-s-new-environmental-courts\/"},"author":{"name":"Chun Zhang","@id":"https:\/\/dialogue.earth\/en\/#\/schema\/person\/0e886366e2cc2ac25bd72c8926e12ae2"},"headline":"Growing pains for China’s new environmental courts","datePublished":"2015-06-17T13:18:00+00:00","dateModified":"2020-11-10T13:50:12+00:00","mainEntityOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/dialogue.earth\/en\/pollution\/7972-growing-pains-for-china-s-new-environmental-courts\/"},"wordCount":774,"publisher":{"@id":"https:\/\/dialogue.earth\/en\/#organization"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/dialogue.earth\/en\/pollution\/7972-growing-pains-for-china-s-new-environmental-courts\/#primaryimage"},"thumbnailUrl":"https:\/\/dialogue.earth\/content\/uploads\/2020\/05\/hammer-719066_640.jpg","articleSection":["Pollution"],"inLanguage":"en"},{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/dialogue.earth\/en\/pollution\/7972-growing-pains-for-china-s-new-environmental-courts\/","url":"https:\/\/dialogue.earth\/en\/pollution\/7972-growing-pains-for-china-s-new-environmental-courts\/","name":"Growing pains for China's new environmental courts | Dialogue Earth","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/dialogue.earth\/en\/#website"},"primaryImageOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/dialogue.earth\/en\/pollution\/7972-growing-pains-for-china-s-new-environmental-courts\/#primaryimage"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/dialogue.earth\/en\/pollution\/7972-growing-pains-for-china-s-new-environmental-courts\/#primaryimage"},"thumbnailUrl":"https:\/\/dialogue.earth\/content\/uploads\/2020\/05\/hammer-719066_640.jpg","datePublished":"2015-06-17T13:18:00+00:00","dateModified":"2020-11-10T13:50:12+00:00","description":"China is scaling up its environmental courts, but there may not be enough experienced judges to hear complex pollution cases","breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/dialogue.earth\/en\/pollution\/7972-growing-pains-for-china-s-new-environmental-courts\/#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/dialogue.earth\/en\/pollution\/7972-growing-pains-for-china-s-new-environmental-courts\/"]}]},{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en","@id":"https:\/\/dialogue.earth\/en\/pollution\/7972-growing-pains-for-china-s-new-environmental-courts\/#primaryimage","url":"https:\/\/dialogue.earth\/content\/uploads\/2020\/05\/hammer-719066_640.jpg","contentUrl":"https:\/\/dialogue.earth\/content\/uploads\/2020\/05\/hammer-719066_640.jpg","width":640,"height":480,"caption":"a gavel, china's environmental courts"},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/dialogue.earth\/en\/pollution\/7972-growing-pains-for-china-s-new-environmental-courts\/#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/dialogue.earth\/en\/"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"Growing pains for China’s new environmental courts"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/dialogue.earth\/en\/#website","url":"https:\/\/dialogue.earth\/en\/","name":"Dialogue Earth","description":"Global climate and environment news","publisher":{"@id":"https:\/\/dialogue.earth\/en\/#organization"},"potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/dialogue.earth\/en\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":{"@type":"PropertyValueSpecification","valueRequired":true,"valueName":"search_term_string"}}],"inLanguage":"en"},{"@type":"Organization","@id":"https:\/\/dialogue.earth\/en\/#organization","name":"\u5bf9\u8bdd\u5730\u7403","url":"https:\/\/dialogue.earth\/en\/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en","@id":"https:\/\/dialogue.earth\/en\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/dialogue.earth\/content\/uploads\/2024\/04\/Dialogue-Earth-Symbol-Logo_Black-Text.png","contentUrl":"https:\/\/dialogue.earth\/content\/uploads\/2024\/04\/Dialogue-Earth-Symbol-Logo_Black-Text.png","width":256,"height":256,"caption":"\u5bf9\u8bdd\u5730\u7403"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/dialogue.earth\/en\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/"},"sameAs":["https:\/\/twitter.com\/DialogueEarth_","","https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/DialogueEarth.English","https:\/\/www.instagram.com\/dialogue.earth\/","https:\/\/www.linkedin.com\/company\/dialogueearth\/"],"publishingPrinciples":"https:\/\/dialogue.earth\/en\/about\/"},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/dialogue.earth\/en\/#\/schema\/person\/0e886366e2cc2ac25bd72c8926e12ae2","name":"Chun Zhang","description":"Zhang Chun is a senior researcher at China Dialogue.","url":"https:\/\/dialogue.earth\/en\/author\/zhangchun\/","sameAs":["https:\/\/dialogue.earth\/en\/author\/zhangchun\/"]}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dialogue.earth\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/32972","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dialogue.earth\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dialogue.earth\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dialogue.earth\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1281"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dialogue.earth\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=32972"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dialogue.earth\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/32972\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dialogue.earth\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/58013"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dialogue.earth\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=32972"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dialogue.earth\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=32972"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dialogue.earth\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=32972"},{"taxonomy":"hashtags","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dialogue.earth\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/hashtags?post=32972"},{"taxonomy":"country","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dialogue.earth\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/country?post=32972"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}