China's down-to-earth and action-oriented approach to battle
climate change will guide the country on a new path of
industrialization featuring low consumption and low emission,
officials and experts say, dismissing suggestions that the country
is a "threat" to the global environment.
"The basic thrust of all our policies is to adapt to climate
change within the framework of sustainable development," said Chen
Ying, a senior research fellow with the Research Center for
Sustainable Development, affiliated to the Chinese Academy of
Social Sciences.
The government has set a goal of reducing energy consumption per
unit of gross domestic product by 20 percent and emissions of major
pollutants by 10 percent between 2005 and 2010.
The targets have been incorporated in the National Climate
Change Program, the first of its kind in developing countries,
which was released on Monday on the eve of President Hu Jintao's
visit to Germany to attend the G8 Summit.
The summit will address climate change among other major
issues.
The program is also in consonance with a series of historic and
recent efforts made by China, including the establishment of
coordination units and active involvement in the Clean Development
Mechanism, a carbon credit trading system under the Kyoto
Protocol.
Chen said the target is a practical approach for China. "The
cap-and-trade model under the Kyoto Protocol is not easily
acceptable to developing countries at present," she added.
Liu Deshun, a professor at the Climate Change Institute of
Tsinghua University, said that climate change presents
opportunities to China so that it can avoid mistakes made by
industrialized nations.
Ma Kai, minister of the National Development and Regulation
Commission, said earlier that China would resort to more
legislative and economic means to address climate change.
He also contended that it is unfair to say China poses a threat
to the global environment because the country's average and
cumulative emissions both are low.
Also, according to the International Energy Agency, China's
emission intensity fell by 49.5 percent in 2004 over the 1990
level, a much sharper drop than the world average decrease of 12.6
percent.
It is also notable that China, as a big exporter of finished
goods, meets much of the global demand for high energy-consuming
goods and therefore generates a greater amount of emissions, Ma
said.
"Can we achieve the target? Let's wait and see in 2010," he
said.
Though there is no agreement on a post-Kyoto Protocol treaty,
many countries including the United States, Germany and Japan have
put forward different proposals of their own. Despite differences,
the international community is in agreement 2009 must be the
deadline for a new treaty to continue playing the role of the Kyoto
Protocol, which will expire in 2012.
(China Daily June 7, 2007)
