COMMENTATOR (COMM): Previously on Life. . .

ANNA THIBAIUKA: This is a century of cities and the challenge therefore facing us is how to make cities a better place.

SHEELA PATEL: Clean water, solid waste, garbage: things like that have to be planned for the whole city.

PROFESSOR ED GLAESER: The difficulty is the twin dilemmas of, of attempting to deal with providing basic services and attempting to deal with the massive amount of poverty that plagues so many of the megacities of the world.

COMM: The Chinese are on the move. As part of the biggest migration ever, they are moving into the cities. Turning their backs on rural poverty and heading for the metropolis to seeks their fortunes. Many leave their families behind in the country. Their aim: to earn enough money to send home to support them.

These men are looking for work as labourers, carpenters and welders. Advertising their skills on handmade signs. Women often want jobs as sales clerks, waitresses and maids. Altogether, twelve million Chinese are pouring into the cities every year. In an historic demographic shift, Chinese city dwellers are will overtake the rural population within a generation. To manage this change, China plans to build four hundred new cities over the next twenty years, each housing over five hundred thousand residents. Chinese cities new and old are straining to provide all these citizens with a healthy environment and a better standard of living. This is the story of how one Chinese city is merging its fabled history with present realities to begin THE LONG MARCH to a sustainable future.

Chengdu, the capital of Sichuan province in South West China is famous for its fiery hot peppers. There's an old Chinese saying, 'As Sichuan goes, so goes China.' But in 1985, both Sichuan and Chengdu were experiencing some pretty rough going. It proved a wake-up call. Da Pengfu remembers when he first became concerned.

DA PENGFU, Teacher, Long Jiang Lu Elementary School (TRANSLATION): I started teaching Natural Science in 1978 and was extremely interested in nature. Later, I wrote a book called "The Silent Spring". I realised that in the '80's the most sensitive topic in China was the environment.

COMM: Huang Shi Da is an engineer, unaccustomed to fear.

HUANG SHIDA, Designer, Living Water Garden Wetlands (Translation): Pollution isn't frightening. What's frightening is if you don't deal with pollution and put importance on it. First, you need to decrease the amount of pollution, then you need to purify the water and send it back to nature.

COMM: Wang Zuo Hua believes the answer is involving everyone. Including the children.

WANG ZUOHUA, (TRANSLATION): People must participate in environmental protection from the time they are young and involving generation after generation. When we protect the environment we protect ourselves: our lives depend on the environment.

COMM: Over the last decade, the people of Chengdu have mounted a massive effort to reinvent their city, starting with the river that runs through it. The Fu and Nan Rivers that encircle the inner city of Chengdu were once collectively known as the Brocade River. Silk Brocade was the famed material exported on the long and torturous Silk Road. Legend has it that the name came about because the River was so clean that when the fabric was washed in the river it would come out brighter and more lustrous. By the 1980s this was certainly not the case.

HUANG SHIDA (TRANSLATION) : Chengdu's Fu-Nan Rivers because of urban development became very polluted. Before 1990 this river became so polluted that is was unsuitable for people to live beside.

MR WANG, Relocated Resident, Chengdu (TRANSLATION): Agh! It was filthy! The public toilets were the worst.

LITTLE BOY (TRANSLATION): We called Fu-Nan rivers the Fulan, "the Rotten River"!

PU BO Former Student, Long Jiang Lu Primary School (TRANSLATION): The river ran right in front of our school and it was very dirty and we wanted very much for it to be clean.

ZHANG JIHAI, Secretary General, Communist Party, Chengdu (TRANSLATION): Just the Government determination or just money is far from enough: students, citizens, grandmothers, grandfathers, workers, farmers - everyone participated.

COMM: To address their city's most pressing environmental problem, the people of Chengdu decided they had to master the principles of living water and to completely revitalize their river system.

BETSY DAMON, Executive Director, Keepers of the Waters: Thirty years ago, forty years ago, the entire population would jump in here on hot days. They fished fifty-four different kinds of fish out of here. They lived from this river, they washed in this river - the river is their heart.

DA PENGFU (TRANSLATION): Near our school, just across the bridge there was a silk factory, a paper factory, a soap factory and a paint factory. They were all serious polluters.

COMM: Da Pengfu teaches natural sciences at the Long Jiang Lu elementary school situated right beside the river. He has been using Chengdu's Fu-Nan rivers system as a living laboratory with his students since he began teaching. In 1985, his students became the catalyst that set in motion a process which is now transforming the city.

DA PENGFU, Teacher, Long Jiang Lu Elementary School (TRANSLATION ): When we were students we could swim in the river whenever we wanted, we really enjoyed it, but when I was teaching in 1985 there was no way you could swim in this river and I realised this was a problem.

COMM: Da campaigned relentlessly to promote environmental education in the school system, his goal: to inspire the children to spearhead the movement to clean up the city's most obvious environmental problem.

DA PENGFU (TRANSLATION): I felt that if the children had a deep understanding of the river that it would nurture a feeling of respect. So I organised the Little Guards of the Fu-Nan Rivers.

COMM: Da and his students took field trips to study the river. They identified and photographed the sources of pollution. And they came to the conclusion that without powerful allies they couldn't solve the problem. Pu Bo was twelve years old in 1985. She remembers it well.

PU BO, Former student, Long Jiang Lu Primary School (TRANSLATION ): We thought, what can few primary students do? So we decided to write the Mayor a letter and ask the city government to help us.

COMM: Hu Maozhou was Chengdu's mayor in 1985. He was touched by the children's plea.

HU MAOZHOU, Former Mayor, Chengdu Municipal Government (TRANSLATION): I felt it was a big responsibility. But there is so much to do in the city and I was concerned there wasn't enough money for such a big engineering project.

COMM: In a country as old as China and a city as old as Chengdu to understand the present you need first to understand the past. The story of Chengdu begins a very long time ago, indeed. Chengdu has been the site of human habitation for as long as anyone can remember. One of the birthplaces of settled agriculture, Sichuan has always excelled at feeding a very large number of people. Dig anywhere in the Chengdu basin and you are bound to strike history.

CHEN ZIANDAN, Deputy Director, Sichuan Provincial Museum (TRANSLATION): The first signs of humans on the Chengdu basin are from two million years ago. In addition we have found numerous ancient human fossils at sites around Chengdu dating back 70,000 to 100,000 years ago. The Chengdu Plains' civilization probably emerged around 4,000 years ago.

COMM: The fascinating and mysterious Ba Shu Civilization was considered mythical until relics were unearthed at San Xing Dui just forty-five kilometres from present day Chengdu. Archaeological evidence shows that the Chengdu basin has been inhabited continuously since pre-history. The regions owes much of its success to the steady stream of cold, clear, pure water that has flowed this way, uninterrupted for million of years. The Min River, a tributary of the Yangtze, feeds the Chengdu basin and comes from the Himalayan Mountains. From early on, the Chinese people learned to harness the river. Here at Dujiangyan, famed Chinese Scholar and Engineer Li Bing completed an ambitious project to irrigate the vast plain over 2,250 years ago. Way back then, without the benefit of modern machinery, Chinese workers diverted the Min River into a web of canals that opened new fertile farmlands. It was this amazing accomplishment that spurred Chinese agriculture and enabled the Chinese population to expand. The Dujiangyan irrigation system is a triumph of engineering feat on par with the Pyramids or the Great Wall of China. But it's not just an historic monument: it's still irrigating the plain today. Repairing the irrigation canals is second nature to the farmers here. They have done it for millennia. Their whole tradition of sustainable agriculture is based on the combination of successful irrigation and replenishing the soil with organic fertilisers.

As growing markets and the seduction of the big city life has brought more and more farmers to Chengdu, some traditions have had to bend to modern ways. But some things are constant and the river at the City's heart continued to flow burdened with ever-greater levels of pollution. Hu Han was one of the students whose activism in 1985 led to the river clean up.

HU HAN, Former Student, Long Jiang Lu Primary School (TRANSLATION): When I was a student I didn't think that this project would be so big! This river passes by our school, by our homes, is right near by. We should care for it. It should be clean and beautiful. That's why we wrote the letter.

DA PENGFU (TRANSLATION) : I thought it was a water quality issue but after we investigated we discovered that it wasn't that simple. Why? Because there were many people living around the river, we hadn't talked about that -besides cleaning up the river, all the people will have to be re-housed.

COMM: The students' appeal set off a long chain of events. It took several years of planning and massive efforts to build public consensus but in 1992 Chengdu began a five-year plan called the Fu-Nan Rivers Revitalisation Project. Central to the plan was the removal and relocation of the factories responsible for the pollution, replacing the dilapidated shanties that had sprung up haphazardly along the riverside, and completely restoring the banks with public spaces.

ZHANG JIHAI, Secretary General, Communist Party, Chengdu (TRANSLATION): We had three very large problems to solve; one: where does the financing come from? Two: how do we handle the fact that so many businesses and residents have to be relocated, and three: what is the vision for this project? We needed a concept on how we wanted to design the renovations and we needed a consensus to make it happen.

COMM: Every level of the local, district and municipal government was involved in both the planning and implementation of the project. An enormous education campaign was launched to make everyone aware of the problems of the river and to gain their support for the rehabilitation. The costs were kept to a minimum by including the participation of so many units and accepting voluntary labour. Even individuals made voluntary donations.

ZHANG JIHAI (TRANSLATION): The Fu-Nan Rivers Revitalisation Project met many obstacles but the biggest one was the need to relocate 30,000 households and there were 1,000 businesses, many of which had been there for a very long time and had become attached to the place. This was really difficult.

COMM: To begin the rehabilitation the riverbanks it was first necessary to relocate over 100,000 residents from the riverside. Entire communities had to be moved into new apartment blocks specifically built for them. Leaving your home is never easy, but many of the people who lived by the Fu-Nan rivers were eager to go.

MR WANG, Relocated Resident, Chengdu (TRANSLATION): The Mayor said the government wanted to clean up the river. When I heard this I was really happy because it meant that I could have a new house and leave this really polluted place.

COMM: For some it meant the end of monotonous and laborious chores.

MR XIANG, Relocated Resident, Chengdu (TRANSLATION): When I was young the first thing I had to do when I got home was fetch two loads of water. I couldn't enjoy myself when I went out to play because I was in charge of carrying the water.

COMM: The people who lived along the Fu-Nan rivers in the 1980's were among the poorest in the city. When they were able to move to new housing it was a step up.

XIANG GRANDFATHER (TRANSLATION): I used to live at 57, Xia He Bao, the houses there were old traditional one story buildings all packed together side by side and they all had tile roofs. When it rained hard it leaked a lot, when it rained a little it leaked a little.

MRS XIANG (TRANSLATION): We didn't have running water before - the government did this for us! Running water is very convenient.

MR XIANG (TRANSLATION): We're satisfied with the apartment. For one thing it's pretty big.

YOUNG WOMAN (TRANSLATION): It doesn't leak! It has a toilet.

ALL (TRANSLATION): That's right! It doesn't leak.

YOUNG MAN (TRANSLATION): Yes, it doesn't leak - we've got a toilet!

YOUNG WOMAN (TRANSLATION): In the past even going to the bathroom was a pain. Having to line up at the public toilet was pretty funny. In the morning there was usually not enough time to stand in line. And then there was bathing. There was no drain, so we could only take a bucket of water and bathe in the public toilets. That was in the summer. In the winter it was impossible!

COMM: Altogether, the city built 24 new housing complexes with priority given to those who had to move. The average relocated resident gained more living space, running water, heating and other services and a much more comfortable life. Relocating people to make way for public works is always controversial, but given the ambition of Chengdu's plan this was managed with remarkable sensitivity. The accomplishment has not gone unnoticed. The city helped to raise funds by building additional higher priced housing that was sold to some of the cities more affluent residents. The money raised helped to pay for the relocation of those less well off. Chengdu spent 330,000 000 US dollars over five years rehabilitating its river system. Over 600 wastewater outlets that once emptied into the river were removed. The entire length of the river was dredged and its width increased by half. Forty-two kilometres of the river-bank were reconstructed and 20,000 trees were planted as the city added 25 hectares of green public spaces.

BETSY DAMON, Executive Director, Keepers of the Waters: We need in our urban environment to live with natural systems and to have a deep understanding of the natural systems. Rather than try to eliminate them or exclude them. For a lot of reasons - not only to understand them but because of the quality of life that it brings back in the city, the freshness, the biodiversity that returns.

COMM: Betsy Damon was an American artist whose imagination and dedication to water quality have helped to build in Chengdu a very special monument. The Living Water Garden in Chengdu is a very popular place. This innovative public space is a recreational park, a water treatment facility and a classroom that teaches everyone who goes there the way nature cleans water. Huang Shi Da led the design of the Park's constructed wetlands.

HUANG SHIDA, Designer, Living Water Garden Wetlands (TRANSLATION): The water is piped from the microbe pool to the plant pool and the constructed wetlands area. In this plant pool here, the primary growth is duckweed - here, let me show you, if you clear away the duck weed you can see the water is much clearer here. These reeds are not growing on earth but are growing on stones! There is one metre of stones at the bottom that the reeds grow on. The water filters through the stones and the pollution clings to them. The rocks have an absorbent quality. Microbes then also start growing on the rocks. They break down the pollution which then becomes nutrients for the plants. When the plants are old, they are carried away. Carrying the plants away, essentially removes the pollution, and water is clean!

COMM: Over the last decade Chengdu has made a real commitment to provide cleaner water and a healthier environment for its citizens.

VOX POP - STUDENT WITH MOTHER (TRANSLATION): Since the riverside has been fixed up everybody comes down here.

VOX POP - FUNAN RIVER GUARDIAN (TRANSLATION): In the future it will be even more beautiful.

VOX POP - MAN WITH BABY (TRANSLATION): I hope one day the Funan can be like the Seine in Paris.

COMM: Propelled by the innocent hopes of its school children much of Chengdu is now transformed. And the teachers and students at Long Jiang Lu Elementary School are still leading the way.

WANG ZUOHUA, Teacher, Long Jiang Lu Elementary School (TRANSLATION): The Funan Revitalization has come a long way. But there is still a long way to go. The quality of the water is still not clean enough. That's what we teachers have to do, generation after generation. We need to teach our students that we can't live without our environment and that together with all the people of the world we can make a more beautiful earth.

COMM: The lessons of Living Water Garden are now being replicated in other parks including the "Experience Water Park" being built on Chengdu's Northwestern outskirts. Officials from other Chinese municipalities have asked Huang Shida's advice on how to create Living Water Gardens in their cities. And Huang has even bigger plans: to develop new constructed wetlands ten times the size of the Living Water Garden in the lands surrounding Chengdu.

HUANG SHIDA (TRANSLATION :) This is a new development area called Lung Tsin Ye. We could see more wild animals, birds, insects, amphibians - they would all be more plentiful because of the large size of this new park. I would like to call it the Wetlands Ecological Park.

COMM: The Government officials in Chengdu found many lessons in their experiences.

ZHANG JIHAI, Secretary General, Communist Party, Chengdu (TRANSLATION): We as a developing country need to develop our economy, but we absolutely at the same time must do this environmentally. I think that polluting first and then cleaning-up is an extremely uneconomic and irresponsible way of doing things. This is the way I see it.

COMM: The Chengdu River Revitalization is a model of consensus building and participation. It's showing other cities in China and around the world how local communities on their own initiative can solve fundamental environment problems and so progress on THE LONG MARCH to a sustainable future.

Next week, City Life travels to Dhaka in Bangladesh and listens to protestors who say globalisation is undermining the health of poor people around the world.