CHANGES OF ENVIRONMENTAL CHARACTERISTICS OF THE ASIAN “ECONOMIC GIANTS” IN THE CONTEXT OF THE GEOECOLOGICAL TRANSITION

Abstract

Since the end of the last century the epicenter of environmental problems and global environmental threats has moved to Asia. Three economic giants played the main role: at first Japan, then China and India. In recent decades increasingly complicated and multidirectional environmentally significant processes have taken place in these Asian countries, which are at different stages of socio-economic development. The purpose of the study was to identify the main trends in the basic environmental characteristics of Japan, China and India and study the dynamics of their position in the context of the geoecological transition. The work was based on the concepts of the environmental Kuznets curve (EKC) and the geoecological transition of D.L. Lopatnikov. Comparison of environmental and economic parameters was carried out on the basis of statistical data from the World Bank, OECD and national databases. Time series for sulfur dioxide, nitrogen oxides, particulate matter and carbon dioxide emissions were analyzed mainly for the period 1990-2020. The dynamics of the countries’ position on the curve over a 30-year period makes it possible to identify the trajectories of their environmental development, as well as determine prospects for the short-term future. According to the dynamics of key indicators, Japan is steadily on a downward segment of the curve, while China and India are on a downward segment for some indicators, having passed an inflection point during the period under study, and on an upward segment for other ones. The interpretation of dynamics of the environmental indicators revealed the main factors (economic, institutional, technological, etc.) which lay behind their environmental advancement. At the same time, the economic slowdown during the 2008-2009 global economic crisis and the COVID-19 pandemic had a different impact on the key indicators of the three countries. The position of countries in the international environmental ratings correlates with the level of socio-economic development, which fits into the logic of the EKC. While the first signs of a turn towards the greener economy are already visible in China, the same is still not true for India. The environmentally positive trends which were identified for the economic giants of Asia, with the exception of Japan, cannot yet be considered a long-term trend due to the relatively short series of data and the continuing diversity of their environmental prospects.