Societal metabolism in Northeast China: Case study of Liaoning Province

Societal metabolism is now the outstanding emphasis of the study of sustainability. Although a great deal of studies have been done for national socio-economic systems, few results are available for subdivision level, especially in China which is the world manufacture center and one of the most important economic entities of the world. Based on the method of material flow analysis (MFA), societal metabolism in Liaoning Province, one of subdivisions of Northeast China, is studied in this article. This research can be regarded as the first attempt for studying societal metabolism of provincial socio-economic systems in China. A set of MFA indicators are measured to illustrate the quantity and quality of societal metabolism in Liaoning Province because of the lack of imports and exports data for provincial socio-economic systems. The study covers the time period from 1990 to 2003 when the Chinese central government was making great efforts to vitalize the Northeast China's traditional industrial base. MFA indicators are integrated with economic and demographic indicators to scale the material intensity and efficiency of Liaoning's socio-economic system. The results show that the quantitative development of societal metabolism in Liaoning is similar with that of China in the same period, which can be divided into three phases highly matching up to the Eighth, Ninth, and Tenth Five-Year National Economy and Social Development Plans implemented by Chinese central government. The results prove that the societal metabolism of a socio-economic system is greatly dominated by the macro-policy in China. Moreover, the relative amount of societal metabolism in Liaoning is higher than the average level of China. However, the quantitative advantage of societal metabolism did not succeed to satisfied economic and social return. The efficiency of societal metabolism in Liaoning is lower than the average level of whole China, and of course extremely lower than that of developed countries. For instance, Liaoning's Gross Domestic Product (GDP) generated by unit input of natural resources in 2003 is roughly equal to 30% of the average level of 15 main countries in European Union in 2000 and 10% of the average level of Japan in 1996. The methodology development for MFA in subdivision level is discussed and future research is proposed.