China: Economy before environment

BEIJING, China (AP) -- China promised Monday to better control emissions of greenhouse gases, unveiling its first national program to combat global warming, but rejected mandatory caps on emissions as unfair to countries still trying to catch up with the developed West.

While the program offered few new concrete targets for reducing emissions of the greenhouse gases that are believed to contribute to global warming, it outlined steps China would take to meet a previously announced government goal of improving overall energy efficiency in 2010 by 20 percent over 2005's level.

"China is a developing country. Although we do not have the obligation to cut emissions, it does not mean we do not want to shoulder our share of responsibilities," said Ma Kai, the minister heading the National Development and Reform Commission, the Cabinet-level economic planning agency.

"We must reconcile the need for development with the need for environmental protection," he told reporters. "In its course of modernization, China will not tread the traditional path of industrialization, featuring high consumption and high emissions. In fact, we want to blaze a new path to industrialization."

Ma, however, stressed that the bulk of responsibility for battling climate change still lay with industrialized countries, which "are in a better position to cap emissions."

He said they also have the obligation to provide financial and technical support to developing nations -- like China -- whose "overriding priority at the moment is still economic development and poverty eradication."

The program was laid out in a 62-page report released by the NDRC on Monday, apparently an attempt to pre-empt criticism of China when Chinese President Hu Jintao attends an expanded summit of the Group of Eight industrialized nations in Germany this Friday. The summit will feature a session on global warming.

Assistant Foreign Minister Cui Tiankai said Hu will "expand China's views and propositions on climate change" at the meeting, but did not give any details.

"China's population is one-fifth of the world population, which means one out of five of the world's population affected by climate change will come from China," Cui said at a briefing on Hu's trip. "That is why the Chinese government takes this issue very seriously. ... We need to place our development on energy conservation that is secure and sustainable."

Increasing international pressure
China has fallen under increasing pressure internationally to take more forceful measures to curb releases of greenhouse gases. The country relies on coal -- among the dirtiest of fuels -- to meet two-thirds of its energy needs and is projected to surpass the U.S. as the world's No. 1 emitter of greenhouse gases sometime in the next two years.

The new plan calls for stepped-up efforts to put the hard-charging but inefficient economy on a more sustainable footing and promises "to make significant achievements in controlling greenhouse gas emissions," according to the NDRC report.

The measures include expanded research and deployment of fresh energy-saving technologies, improvement of agricultural infrastructure, increased tree-planting and water resource management, and greater public awareness of the issue.

Ma said implementation will "cost a fortune" but did not elaborate, stressing that it would be an investment in prevention.

Given an economy that has been growing at better than 9 percent annually over the past 25 years, the plan's overall effect, if implemented, would be to slow the increase in greenhouse gases, not reduce their absolute amount.

In explaining the program, Ma said global warming was largely caused by 200 years of unrestrained industrialization by the West and that it would be unfair to impose mandatory emissions caps on China and other developing nations.

"It is neither realistic nor fair to ... overlook the different stages of development that different countries are in and to use climate change as an excuse to ask them to undertake quantified emissions-reductions commitments," Ma said.

He added: "This would hinder the development of developing countries and hamper their industrialization."

Ma also called U.S. President George W. Bush's new initiative on global warming a "useful complement" to the United Nations' Kyoto Protocol but said it should not be a substitute for the treaty, which expires in 2012.

Bush proposed last week that the 15 biggest emitters of greenhouse gases hold meetings and set an emissions goal, but each country -- including the U.S., China, India and the major European countries -- would be able to decide individually how to implement it.

The 1997 Kyoto Protocol is an international treaty that caps the amount of carbon dioxide that can be emitted from power plants and factories in industrialized countries. Currently, developing countries like China and India are exempt from its obligations.

Chen Dongmei, director of WWF China's Climate Change and Energy Program, said the nature-conservation group welcomed the NDRC's report because it was "the first time the national government is talking about energy reduction."

"China should play a very important role in future climate action," Chen said. "It's a good first step. If they can stick to this direction and strategy, we will see a more active and aggressive role and action eventually."

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