Workers install solar collectors over a fish pond for the development of green energy in Yuyao, province of Zhejiang. (Photo/Xinhua)
China will take effective measures to treat environmentally friendly trade barriers when it moves towards carbon neutrality, as the state work report, which was delivered on Wednesday at the opening of the third meeting of the 14th National Congress.
Green Trade Barriers usually contain measures that impose restrictions or requirements for imported products to ensure compliance with specific environmental standards.
The country will work actively and carefully towards its climate goals in order to achieve carbon dioxide emissions before 2030 and to achieve carbon neutrality before 2060, according to the report, in which specific measures for the further development of these goals are listed.
According to the report, China will steadily expand the second row of experiments for the amount of the profit of carbon dioxide emissions and not determine carbon industrial parks and factories. It is also planned to accelerate the establishment of a framework to control the total amount and intensity of carbon emissions and to expand the national market for carbon trade in order to cover more industrial sectors.
The nation will accelerate the construction of new energy in deserts and other dry regions, develop offshore wind farms and promote both the integration of renewable energies into local networks and the construction of transmission routes, the report says.
The report also emphasized the measures that China will introduce in response to environmentally friendly commercial barriers. The country will launch statistics and accounting initiatives for carbon emissions, develop systems for the management of CO2 footprints and set up carbon labeling and certification systems.
Ma jun, director of the institute for public and ecological matters based in Beijing, said that the green trade barriers differ from other types of commercial barriers, since they include measures that match the global efforts to combat climate change, the loss of biological diversity and soil.
“From this perspective, green trade barriers have some valid components. So we have to react effectively to them,” he said.
He found that several important aspiring green trade barriers are associated in their life cycles, he stated. While some countries and regions have decades of experience in this area, China remains significantly behind.
“But China vigorously promotes the work, with various government departments being actively involved,” he said, quoting a plan that was jointly presented as an example by 15 national government agencies, including the Ministry of Ecology and Environment.
By 2027, China is aiming to develop national guidelines for the calculation of CO2 foot traces of products in harmony with international standards and to set calculation rules and standards for approximately 100 key products according to the plan.
According to MA, China's initiatives to combat environmentally friendly commercial barriers can not only make it easier to improve the domestic industry, but also promote their transition towards sustainability.
According to a report on the implementation of the plan 2024, which was also checked by the national legislators on Wednesday, positive progress was made in the country's climate goals last year.
About 360 million kilowatts or more than 82 percent of the newly installed electricity capacity of China last year came from wind and solar energy.
With its entire installed capacity of wind and solar energy of more than 1.4 billion kilowatts last year, China reached his proposed goal six years before the schedule.
(Web editor: Tian Yi, Zhong Wenxing)