观点丨许勤华：Follow Green Development with Chinese-style Modernization

Since the 18th National Congress of the CPC in 2012, China has steadfastly pursued ecological priority and green development, and achieved a miracle of green development that has attracted worldwide attention and gone down in history. The white paper "China's Green Development in the New Era" summarizes the situation of China's green development from seven aspects over the past decade, which tells the world what we have done, what we are doing and also let ourselves know. To this point, the release of the white paper is very meaningful.

For a long time, there is a view that green development brings both opportunities and costs to the Chinese economy. But in fact, green development is full of opportunities instead of bringing costs. Just as President Xi said“lucid waters and lush mountains are invaluable assets”. Natural resources are the basis of economic and social development. As mentioned in the white paper, we have utilized technological innovations to transform natural resources into economic output. In 2021, the output value of China's energy conservation and environmental protection industry exceeded 8 trillion yuan. Many places are actively exploring ways to realize the value of ecological products, such as urban modern agriculture, eco-environmental tourism, forest healthcare, etc. These mean that we have not only increased the quantity but also improved the quality of our economy. Meanwhile, the ecological civilization has become our national strategy.

China is playing an important role in green economic development around the world, which will also inject a strong impetus into world economic recovery. Chinese-style green development pattern achieves the target of improve quality and efficiency, by the way of integrating the upstream-raw materials, midstream-goods and the downstream-consumption together, upgrade the manufacture and industry, strengthen the supply chain. For example, in the latest years, the 3% growth rate of energy inputs has been supporting the 6% economic growth rate.

China can play a leading role in the economic green recovery in the world. In 2023, China is focusing on the reviving economic activity. Green economic recovery will increase green investments, stimulate green technology research and development, create green jobs and facilitate the ecological value conversion to foster the economic growth points.

Green development cannot be achieved without the participation of private enterprises. The private economy has become an indispensable force to promote the high-quality development of our economy. To guide the healthy development of the private economy, it is necessary to encourage private enterprises to practice ESG and assume social responsibilities. China can focus on the following four aspects: Firstly, we can use the government-oriented approach to encourage private enterprises to practice ESG.

Secondly, we can take advantage of the market-oriented approach to “let the market play a decisive role in allocating resources” and guide market capital into ESG investment. Thirdly, we should pay attention to the value realization of ecological products through ownership reform and construction of the carbon emissions trading market. Lastly, we can utilize green finance, including bonds, insurances and funds, to set up a multilateral, market-oriented system to help private enterprises to get involved in ESG practices.