Yes but this still does not have anything to do with China. NAFTA did NOT include China. The pollution in China is a direct result of all of the industrialized countries using China has the factory of the world to make everything including some of the toxic products or the the step in the manufacturing process that involves the most polluting and toxic ingredients that they otherwise would've had to incur hefty cost to control and mitigate the environmental impact or would've even been allowed to manufacture in their own countries due to the pressure from the environmental and various watchdog organizations. They pay dirt cheap price to make at-the-time third world countries like China and other nations to make them. China was poor at the time and was eager to make money and the West had the money but is interested in keeping their own soil, water and air clean so everybody is happy. And you are right there is no EPA regulations (weak as it is in the West) in China that would've otherwise kept tighter scrutiny on the environmental impact of the manufacturing process.
China's pollution is not only stemming from just being the factory of the world; it's also the landfill of the world. All those non-biodegradable products, where do you think they end up? They are not in your backyard. They all end up getting dumped in China.
Well what goes around comes around because we are all inhabiting the same earth so pollution in one place would eventually find its way to reach another. Just because the pollution is not in your backyard doesn't mean it doesn't exist. And now that China is rich, it's natural that it wants to buy up cleaner land to compensate. It's the west's corporate greed that dirtied China's land, now it needs to pay China back with clean land. If Australia and New Zealand wants to complain, they should complain to the USA, the country in the west that has the heaviest industrialization that just sought to fatten its own pockets and at the same time turn a blind eye to problems.
Yes, lets out-Law guns because they make people kill each other, or lets outlaw cars because they make people drink and drive. Seriously? You want to blame the west for wakening china's greed? So when your credit card is too high? You don't blame yourself,
you blame the item you bought.
You don't know much about China or its Genghis Khan mentality. I agree China should have remained a asleep but NFTA woke them up. Lets use our heads and let the adults take responsibility for there actions. Cheers