Analysis | China’s belt and road: an environmental disaster for Southeast Asia?

Beijing professes to be ‘greening’ its multitrillion-dollar trade initiative, yet has still invested heavily in fossil fuels and the extraction of natural resources

The results could be habitat loss, increased pollution and the destruction of biodiversity, as well as the entrenchment of existing power structures

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A section of the pipelines that run from Myanmar’s coast to the west of China as part of the 771-kilometre long Myanmar-China Oil and Gas Pipeline Project. Photo: Handout

Alex Mark Lechner,John R. Owen,Angela Tritto,Alexander Horstmann,Hoong,Chen Teo,Chee Meng TanandAhimsa Campos-Arceiz

Published: 8:15am, 5 Jan 2020Updated: 8:44pm, 17 Feb 2020

When Chinese President Xi Jinping first unveiled the Belt and Road Initiative in 2013, it was heralded as one of the largest infrastructure development schemes in history.

But the globe-spanning strategy, involving up to US$8.5 trillion in investments spread across more than 80 economies, also poses a number of potential environmental impacts and could threaten biodiversity, which is of particular concern for China’s neighbours in Southeast Asia.

The region is a global biodiversity hotspot and home to numerous threatened species not found anywhere else in the world including charismatic megafauna such as tigers and Asian elephants.

But much of China’s belt and road investment in Southeast Asia have come in the form of fossil fuel projects or natural resource extraction – both of which are likely to cause habitat loss, threaten wildlife and increase pollution.

Much of China’s belt and road investment in Southeast Asia has come in the form of fossil fuel projects. Photo: EPA

Despite Beijing expressing a strong commitment to “greening” its belt and road plan, most of the associated energy investments and contracts have been in fossil fuels.