Rapid Urbanization, Rural Sewage Treatment Approach

Rural water environment is becoming vital in China, as it may influence a lot on social and economic sustainability. Both the Chinese government and the public paid great attention to it, so in the recent years, the government constructed hundreds of wastewater treatment projects in rural areas in the east part of China. So far, most of the projects have been used and put into effect. Looking back to the development history of rural wastewater treatment, the fierce change of treatment mode on rural areas can be perceived.This paper takes the 10 rural wastewater treatment projects In Shanghai and South Jiangsu for example, to clarify the representation of the change, and explore the reasons of the change on these wastewater treatment projects. The economic reason is explained by cost effectiveness analysis, and the management reason is made clear via analyzing the rural wastewater treatment's characteristic of the community public goods, and the disintegration background of rural community mechanism in the rapid urbanization process in current China.One of the development directions of rural wastewater treatment is rebuilding the rural community mechanism. The other direction is to leave aside the rural community, in order to avoid the responsibility of roots lever and the peasants. Specifically, as for the country which has its own wastewater treatment facility, and whose community mechanism does not exist any longer, it is prior to rebuild the rural community than to construct treatment facility. As for the country which is not far from the city, rural wastewater can be treated by urbanization method, which is cost saving. As for the country far away from the city, the maintenance free way can be used for the new rural areas construction.