What is China To Do?

What is China to do? Twenty-five years ago China had little modern industry, an enormous population in poverty and was just beginning to look to the West for examples of how to bring prosperity to its hard working and thrifty people. I was there and saw this firsthand as a U.S. government official taking American industry executives to view the opportunities to bring 20th-century solutions to Chinese industries like steel, coal and manufacturing. A quarter of a century later, on the eve of Copenhagen, I serve as president of the National Center for Sustainable Development (NCSD), a national nonprofit corporation in Washington, D.C., that promotes a low-carbon economy.

This past week we posed that same question to two Chinese Ministry of Finance officials that we elected to our board and management team respectively. This question is also appropriate for the United States. As both countries approach the climate summit, it's clear: Neither country likes being told what to do by others.

What we discovered this week is remarkable. Below the surface of political posturing is the practical reality and acknowledgment that China and the United States must work together to lead the world to a low-carbon future. China has reached out to us as an NGO to help it formulate a new generation of green policies. China's nonprofit CDM Fund Management Center in Beijing manages an interagency fund that is newly formed under the authority of the State Council, supervised by the Ministry of Finance and supported by a portion of each of China's Certified Emission Reduction Certificates (CERs) under the Kyoto framework.

The CDM Fund will help direct education, policymaking and investment into enterprises that must now submit a plan for "getting green" to their regulators. This three-pronged strategy will assist the developing Chinese renewable energy market by devising specific sustainability standards and setting up a legal framework and financial mechanisms to facilitate the country's transition to a "greener" economy. This is a serious commitment. China wasn't forced to make this decision by any deadline or international legal or bi-lateral framework. The Chinese are eminently practical people and as such know it is not economically viable to continue on the same course as today. Taking a 50-year perspective they have concluded, we think, that a low-carbon future holds as much promise for jobs and sustainable development as the industrial revolution that brought prosperity to the developed world. The Chinese want to achieve broad-based prosperity without the waste, inefficiency and pollution the West suffered for 200 years.

Of course, it's hard to turn an ocean liner around. Physical laws of motion apply and cannot be changed by any Copenhagen mandate to do so. It took 200 years of polluting industrial growth to get the developed world to where it is today. China is growing very fast now but from a very low base: I was there and saw it firsthand. China is still a predominantly agricultural country with 80 percent of its people living in poverty. Certainly the coastal cities are urban and as congested as any in the West but this prosperity involves a fraction of the population.

The National Center for Sustainable Development is lucky and very well positioned. We have an unusual insight into Chinese policy at a high and strategic level. Our partner is the Finance Ministry, and it takes a practical approach. Establish policies first, evaluate practical demonstration projects in renewable and cleaner energy use (including coal) and then provide investment. This is a formula for steady progress. China wants the momentum of a successful Copenhagen conference and international cooperation at many levels such as with NCSD. The fact that China is following its own "middle way" between doing nothing and doing everything at once is a reasonable proposition -- and very Chinese.

 

Comments

[dougnoll]

09:52 AM on 11/17/2009

The Chinese, as imminently practical business people, see the handwriting on the wall. If global climate change is not addressed through greener, low carbon emissions technology and industry, sustained economic growth will be impossible. Involving itself in the National Center for Sustainable Development in Washington, D.C. therefore seems to be a move based on enlightened self interest. No one likes to be told what to do--people as well as nations. However, people and nations will adopt behaviors that reward them in the future and will help them grow and prosper. On climate change issues, the focus should follow the Chinese. Let us find ways to make climate change regulation, financing, and technology transfers fulfilling to national interests rather than as a bitter pill to swallowed. Often times, mediation can help parties move beyond their positions to find interests that can be satisfied. Perhaps, bil-lateral and multi-lateral mediations would be of assistance to those nations, such as the United States, that are feeling coerced into solutions. Perhaps the National Center for Sustainable Development could team up with Mediators Beyond Borders to introduce mediation into the decision making process. With mediation, we can get away from the zero-sum positions and work towards sustainable, economically beneficial solutions to global climate change,.

[MrSparrow]

04:12 AM on 11/17/2009

"Neither country likes being told what to do by others." - an attribute formerly referred to as sovereignty.

[ehfang]

05:04 PM on 11/16/2009

Much of China's development over the past 30 years was not predicable in terms of its speed and commitment to the world. Now in the new era of addressing the climate change and clean energy, China is moving in a unprecedented way by utilizing the private structure like NGO to promote the international cooperation for addressing some fundamental policies, regulations and practical issues that will allow their industry in a more healthier development. The fact that its CDM Fund, under the Ministry of Finance could join the National Center for Sustainable Development in Washington DC, a private NGO, demonstrated the desire to look for new ways of cooperation in combat climate change and establish a green economy. No one could predicted China's standing in the world 30 years ago. How did China raise so fast and become a economic powerhouse in the world? The answer is that the government smartly established a series of regulations and policies from ground zero by learning from all industrialized countries in the west. Today, as China facing challenges of addressing climate change, emission of GHG and combat industrial pollution, how can China keep its economic speed of development and yet to balance the GHG emissions becomes top priority of the government. The next generation of green policies and regulations will guide the next 30 years of development. The smart cooperative mode of studying, learning, crafting and implementation of the new policies will drive the next development of China which will certainly benefit US.