Study On The Construction Of Damage Compensation System For Soil Pollution

Land contains everything, nurtures life and is known as the mother of mankind. With the economy booming in China, environmental pollution is increasingly getting worse. So far, we are very concerned about water and air pollution, however, the pollution in soil environment which is one of the most basic conditions of human existence, is poorly understood, as a result, damages resulting from soil pollution get worse day to day. Geologists pointed out that the research shows that more and more dangerous soil elements appear in the soil which were rare or inappreciable in China in the past. Once the soil is contaminated or polluted, full recovery cycle through self-purification capacity would take up to thousands of years. In recent years, soil pollution occurs more and more frequently, however, the content and the system of the compensation of the damages arising from soil pollution is still the gap in legislation. The legislation has not yet cover the areas such as the scope of the legislation, the scope of compensation, liability insurance, liability fund, transfer of burden of proof as well as Presumption of Causation rules. Due to those gaps, the judges could only apply the rules governing compensation liability of the damages under tort law system to handle the cases that has greatly increased the difficulty for the victims who are suffered from the soil pollution damages to obtain adequate compensation to cover the damages caused by the soil pollution, and sometimes even cannot get any compensation. The more far-reaching impact is that the land user will not rationally consider the soil pollution risks, reduce the pollution of soil, soil management and restoration for the long term consideration in the course of utilizing the land. If things continue this way, contaminated/polluted soil cannot be properly treated or recovered, and even more serious soil pollution would come out that would seriously affect the sustainable development of society. Therefore, the establishment of soil pollution damage compensation system is imperative and urgent.