It’s no secret that China is faced with some of the world’s worst pollution. Until now, however, information on the magnitude, scope and impacts of a major contributor to that pollution – human-caused nitrogen emissions – was lacking.

A new study co-authored by Stanford Woods Institute Senior Fellow Peter Vitousek (Biology) reveals, among other findings, that amounts of nitrogen deposited on land and water in China by way of rain, dust and other carriers increased by 60 percent annually from the 1980s to the 2000s, with profound consequences for the country’s people and ecosystems. Xuejun Liu and Fusuo Zhang at China Agricultural University in Beijing led the study, which is part of an ongoing collaboration with Stanford aimed at reducing agricultural nutrient pollution while increasing food production in China – a collaboration that includes Vitousek and Pamela Matson, a Stanford Woods Institute senior fellow and dean of the School of Earth Sciences. The researchers analyzed all available data on bulk nitrogen deposition results from monitoring sites throughout China from 1980 to 2010.

During the past 30 years, China has become by far the largest creator and emitter of nitrogen globally. The country’s use of nitrogen as a fertilizer increased about threefold from the 1980s to 2000s, while livestock numbers and coal combustion increased about fourfold, and the number of automobiles about 20-fold. All of these activities release reactive nitrogen into the environment. Increased levels of nitrogen have led to a range of deleterious impacts, including decreased air quality, acidification of soil and water, increased greenhouse gas concentrations and reduced biological diversity.

“All these changes can be linked to a common driving factor: strong economic growth, which has led to continuous increases in agricultural and nonagricultural reactive nitrogen emissions and consequently increased nitrogen deposition,” the study’s authors write.

Researchers found highly significant increases in bulk nitrogen deposition since the 1980s in China’s industrialized north, southeast and southwest regions. Nitrogen levels on the North China Plain are much higher than those observed in any region in the U.S., and are comparable to the maximum values observed in the U.K. and the Netherlands when nitrogen deposition was at its peak in the 1980s.

China’s rapid industrialization and agricultural expansion have led to continuous increases in nitrogen emissions and nitrogen deposition. China’s production and use of nitrogen-based fertilizers is greater than that of the U.S. and the E.U. combined. Because of inefficiencies, more than half of that fertilizer is lost to the environment in gaseous or dissolved forms.

China’s nitrogen deposition problem could be brought under control, the study’s authors state, if the country’s environmental policy focused on improving nitrogen agricultural use efficiency and reducing nitrogen emissions from all sources, including industry and transit.

Nearly $370,000 has been awarded to Stanford researchers trying to improve conditions in some of the world’s poorest places.

The money comes from the Global Underdevelopment Action Fund, which was established four years ago by the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies to provide seed grants to faculty designing interdisciplinary research experiments.

“It’s money that we can deploy quickly and that we can use in a very flexible way,” says Stephen D. Krasner, deputy director of FSI and chair of the Action Fund awards committee. “We can target specific kinds of activity that we’re interested in — not just because we think the activities themselves are worthwhile, but because we think they can really contribute to the interdisciplinary community that we’re building at FSI.”

The 12 Action Fund grants range from projects with immediate social impact to those designed to build an academic foundation for future work. The seed grants provided by the fund often are the first steps toward a sustainable research project funded by other sources, as well. Krasner says the grants are also awarded in part to impact policy and help solve problems that benefit from a multifaceted approach.

One such project comes from Stephen P. Luby, a professor of medicine and new senior fellow at FSI and the Stanford Woods Institute for the Environment. His project aims to curb pollution from Bangladeshi brick kilns, which may seem like a strange topic for Luby, who studies infectious diseases. But by broadening the viewpoint, the issue is more complex than only replacing the kilns with more efficient models. Solving the problem requires an understanding of social pressures and government regulations as well.

“I’m interested in working with people who want to solve real problems,” Luby says, explaining what brought him to Stanford. “FSI collaboration can really convene the group.” The “intensely interdisciplinary” nature of the project made it perfect for FSI, he says.

“That kind of project can have a real impact on health,” says Krasner, who adds that interdisciplinary research is key. “It typifies the kind of work that we like to support with the Action Fund.”

Another project will study electricity in East Africa, headed by economics professor and FSI Senior Fellow Frank Wolak. Households powered by solar batteries are found throughout the region, but until recently it has been difficult to determine how the power is being used within the home. Wolak’s team will use iPad tools to track household appliance usage and investigate how households are making decisions about power consumption. The double-faceted approach will answer crucial questions related to the distribution and use of power in the developing area.

Mariano-Florentino Cuéllar, co-director of FSI’s Center on International Security and Cooperation (CISAC) and incoming director of FSI, was awarded an Action Fund grant to study refugee communities around the world. Cuéllar, a law professor, will focus on a renewed approach to refugee camps for the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), at the U.N.’s request. In addition to Cuéllar’s background in law, the project will also employ students to help rethink camp logistics, architects focused on improving camp design and CISAC’s expertise in maintaining a collaboration with UNHCR.

In three previous rounds of funding since the Action Fund was established in 2010, $694,000 has been awarded to support 19 research projects.

Throughout the spring, past projects will be featured during Action Fund Fridays in Encina Hall. Topics will range from medical technology in India to poverty concerns in rural Africa. Events will be held at noon on March 22, April 26, May 10, May 24 and June 7. 

For more information, visit http://fsi.stanford.edu/events/series/2900 or contact Elena Cryst at 650.723.3369.

In the north Indian state of Rajasthan there are two neighboring districts named Jaipur and Ajmer, and if you traveled by bus from one to the other you would notice almost no difference between them. People in both cities speak the same language, have the same culture, and work in the same kinds of jobs. The demography of both regions is also extremely similar – both areas have roughly the same percentage of Hindus and Muslims, and members of high castes and low castes. Yet both of these cities responded very differently to a pair of events that occurred in the last several decades in India. 

In 1992 a mob of Hindu nationalists destroyed the Babri Mosque in the Indian city of Ayodhya. For years the Babri Mosque had attracted the ire of militant Hindu extremists, who believed that it had been built by Muslim invaders on the site of an ancient Hindu temple. The destruction of the mosque triggered massive Hindu-Muslim riots throughout India. In Jaipur, huge riots gripped the city and led to several deaths. In Ajmer, however, not a single individual was killed in religious rioting.

Flash forward a decade and a half. In 2008 the two cities became sites of another controversy, this time when huge clashes broke out over the Indian government's policy on reservations. In India, members of low castes and indigenous tribal groups are guaranteed a special number of reserved spots in higher education and government jobs, and controversy over the specific allotment in 2008 led to major protests in Rajasthan. This time, however, Ajmer was the city embroiled in serious violence whereas Jaipur remained peaceful.

In short: in Jaipur people fight over religion, and in Ajmer people fight over caste and tribal identities.

All individuals have multiple ethnic identities, and can presumably adopt different identities within different contexts. As the British historian Eric Hobsbawm once put it, someone named Mr. Patel could be an “Indian, a British citizen, a Hindu, a Gujarati-speaker, an ex-colonist from Kenya, [or] a member of a specific caste or kin-group...” Why is it, then, that people in Jaipur fight over religion whereas people in Ajmer fight about castes and tribes? Why do people choose one identity over another?

My research argues that the key factor driving patterns of ethnic conflict is history. The main reason why religion forms the foundation of ethnic conflict in Jaipur is because the state was controlled by a Hindu dynasty that brutally repressed Muslims. In Ajmer, on the other hand, British administrators who discriminated against low castes and tribal groups controlled the state. In Jaipur, this created religion as the main mode of ethnic identification, and everyone in the city today knows that religious identities are paramount. Right next door in Ajmer, however, a person's caste and tribal identity became salient, and everyone there today understands this fact. Historical legacies drive ethnic identification and, by extension, ethnic conflict.    

Determining why we see specific patterns of ethnic conflict is more than merely an academic exercise. First, not all forms of ethnic conflict are equal. In fact, there is a lot of evidence that conflict about language, for example, tends to be non-violent, but conflict about religion very often descends into bloodshed. Second, states have some ability to manipulate ethnic identity, so some policymakers are in the unfortunate position of having to actually prefer one kind of ethnic conflict to another. In India, any politician would prefer linguistic conflict because it will only lead to protests – but religious conflict will likely lead to rioting.

These facts should give pause to policymakers seeking to end ethnic bloodshed in any country around the world. Most major studies of ethnicity today assume that ethnic identities are fluid, constantly shifting, and easy to change. In many cases this may be true, but making this assumption with regards to conflict may end up being dangerous. Historical legacies in India have deeply embedded patterns of ethnic conflict in different regions. Those who wish to stop ethnic violence must first understand the history that lies behind it.

Image

Ajay Verghese, a Shorenstein Postdoctoral Fellow, joins the Walter H. Shorenstein Asia-Pacific Research Center during the 2012–13 academic year from The George Washington University, where he received his PhD in political science in August 2012. His research interests are broadly centered on ethnicity, conflict, and South Asia.