All Change: Hope Springs

March ushers in the official “all-change” of the old guard. Does the new guard mean new policies? Xi’s bold statements and events leading up to this week’s National People’s Congress meetings  lead us to harbour hope for water pollution control. Perhaps new laws will be introduced and enforcement of existing laws tightened. Professor Wang Canfa who has been involved in the drafting and revision of over 30 national and local environmental laws, regulations and decrees talks to us about whether a “new broom sweeps clean” and in case you are rusty on government policies, check out our summary of key water policies and decrees from 2011-2013. With environmental protection at the top of the agenda for the new guard, we also take a closer look at new ways of solving old water issues such as payment for watershed services. China is already the largest provider of these services globally but also plans to be more aggressive and innovative – we take a look at how. In addition, we asked Dr. Changjin Sun, the former Director of the Centre of Ecological & Environmental Economics at the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences to share his views on the development of such services in China. If you are finally convinced you should get on top of water risks but don’t know how, Tien Shao of the World Resources Institute walks us through why tools like the new Aqueduct Water Risk Atlas make mapping water risk as well as identifying investment opportunities easy.