Geoscience Reference
In-Depth Information
Another problem was changing government policy related to farmland
management and development. In order to assist SIIC in the wake of the
fi nancial crisis in 1998, the Shanghai government gave SIIC permission to
develop Dongtan. h e central government began to tighten its policy in
managing farmland, however, and took back the local government's right to
issue land-use permits. h e policy requires that if one square kilometer of
farmland is used for development, the locality must reclaim an equal amount
of land, which Dongtan's planners did not account for.
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Yet another factor
was confl ict between the Chongming local government and SIIC. Although
SIIC has the right to use Dongtan's land, ownership still belongs to Chenjia
town.
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For example, the Chongming county government was eager to speed
up the development of Chenjia town and began to invest in infrastructure,
public transportation, confi scation of farmland, and relocation of the local
peasants.
As one local peasant, Yong Liu, recounted, his family used the money
from the compensation for land confi scation to buy an apartment in the
relocation area. h ey didn't have any other income after they lost their
lands, however. One o' cer from Chenjia town's Agriculture Center said that
the Dongtan project was carried out independently by the government and
SIIC, which thus confl icted with each other (the local government's pace
was much faster than the corporation's).
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h e last major factor was the
changing personalities and leadership at SIIC. h e chairman of the SIIC
board, Laixing Cai, a founder and main supporter of Dongtan, retired in
2008. Shanfeng Dong and Jiang Li were two important members of Dongtan
project who quit their jobs at Arup and joined SIIC, which promptly reas-
signed them to the other Chinese eco-city projects such as Langfang. h e
new chairman Yilong Teng was the Party secretary of the Higher People's
Court, Shanghai. Teng considered the eco-city plan as a part of national
strategy and thought it should be constructed at the political level, not the
corporation's technological level.
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