Energy chiefs from China, India, Japan, the Republic of Korea
and the United States nations that consume nearly half the world's
oil gathered in Beijing on Saturday to seek solutions to their
shared concern on energy issues.
The five key countries made clear their willingness to
strengthen mutual co-operation in front of the common challenge of
energy security, stability and sustainability. The message they
sent at the energy meeting is important and positive for themselves
and the world.
The meeting came at a time when world oil prices keep
fluctuating and energy demand continues to grow.
Oil prices have been particularly buoyant in recent years,
soaring from some US$20 per barrel in 2002 to more than US$70 per
barrel early this year. Though oil prices have currently fallen
from the peak of US$79 per barrel to about US$60, they are still
more than 50 percent higher than that in 2004. It is believed that
global energy demand will only increase.
The reasons behind the oil price volatility are complex and
manifold: Growing demand for oil; concerns over the adequacy of
investment in oil production capacity in the long-term; current low
levels of spare production capacity; refining capacity bottlenecks;
prolonged political instability in some oil producing regions, and
market speculation.
However such fluctuations and increases in international oil
prices have exerted a negative impact on the world economy, in
particular for developing countries.
Hence, this energy meeting was aimed at safeguarding the steady
and sustainable development of the global energy industry and
building a new concept of energy security featuring mutual benefit
and diversified development.
The agreement reached by the five leading energy-consuming
countries to enhance their energy co-operation in a number of areas
is a welcome start. To ensure global energy security, all countries
of the international community are called on to join in.
As a fast-developing country, China is keenly aware of the
necessity to adjust its energy policy in line with its pursuit of
environment-friendly, energy-saving, and sustainable
development.
Extensive economic growth has increasingly tested the limit of
the country's energy supply and environment. It has become a
national consensus that the country can no longer afford to achieve
high-speed economic growth at any cost.
In fact, China has already made improvement of energy efficiency
a top priority in its new development plan. Between 2006 and 2010,
the country will cut the use of energy per unit of gross domestic
product by 20 percent.
Nevertheless, the grim reality that the country has not made
much progress on the reduction of energy intensity so far this
year, shows that more efforts are needed to bring in place policy
incentives to encourage energy saving. On the other hand, it
highlighted the importance to narrow the energy efficiency gap
between China and developed economies.
(China Daily December 18, 2006)
