China’s Green Blueprint

China’s Green Blueprint Raises Stakes at U.N. Climate Talks

Apr 14, 2011 (IPS) - China’s rise as a leader in the environmentally friendly, low-carbon economy is giving the Asian giant new diplomatic muscle for this year’s round of climate change negotiations leading up to the COP17 U.N. summit in Durban, South Africa in November.

The first round of U.N. climate change talks, just concluded in the Thai capital, brought to relief the recognition that China’s expanding green economy is receiving, with China’s negotiators taking on their counterparts from the United States and the European Union - among the traditional adversaries of China at U.N. global warming talks.

Governments from the richer, industrialised nations - the major emitters of polluting greenhouse gases (GHG) since the industrial revolution - had to come to terms with China’s 12th five-year plan, which was unveiled on the eve of the U.N. climate change talks here, Apr. 3-8. This central pillar of policy-making in the Communist-ruled country spelled out an unprecedented raft of initiatives to build an eco-friendly economy.

"China’s five-year plan just came out. We need to congratulate China for doing so," Artur Runge-Metzger, chief climate change negotiator for the EU, told journalists here, before adding a caveat: "We need to see how those measures are to be implemented."

"China’s five-year plan makes a central point in moving towards finding solutions," said Jonathan Pershing, who headed the U.S. government’s delegation at the Bangkok climate change talks. "This is a problem that no country can solve by itself." {continued}