Home » Opinion » Chinese Views
When 'green' GDP is just more greed
By Ni Tao |
November 26, 2009, Thursday
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Print Edition
Print Edition
HOW green is your city's GDP? A couple of years ago, few would probably have given the question serious thought. To some people, fixated by GDP growth, green GDP was an obvious oxymoron in that protecting the environment constituted a drain on growth.
Green was seldom considered worthy of being juxtaposed with the sanctified G-word - virtually a fetish - until 2004, when Premier Wen Jiabao announced green GDP index would replace traditional GDP index as a criterion to rate officials' performance.
Green GDP has since made its way into the Chinese official terminology and caught on as one of the most quoted - and overused - buzzwords.
Notwithstanding its official favor, the term is sometimes tossed around out of expediency, and our misguided thinking about "green GDP" is likely to lead us further down a road of ecological degradation.
Aside from bubble-causing overheated investment in green technology, pursuit of a green economy is a convenient excuse for land seizures that can in no way lead to something green and environmentally sustainable.
This was the observation of Professor Wang Jinnan, a veteran researcher on the evolution of China's green economy, during a forum on environmentally sustainable growth last Sunday.
It was part of his critique of the current investment frenzy in the green industry, now plagued by overcapacity in the solar photovoltaic and wind power sectors.
Wang is the vice president of Chinese Academy for Environmental Planning, a think tank affiliated with the Ministry of Environmental Protection.
His note of caution comes at a time when many shams disguised as green projects are calling into question whether this green drive is sustained by an authentic determination to be environmentally friendly and sustainable, or whether the drive to go green is just another incarnation of the urge to produce glowing GDP figures.
In China's vast northwest, where the sizzling Gobi Desert dominates the landscape, swarms of high-tech companies are trying to cash in on the promise of solar power generation.
Once an unlikely destination for investment, the remote deserts where few had dared to tread are now a huge source of solar energy - it gets more than 3,000 hours of bright sunlight each year, compared with Shanghai's 2,000 hours, according to the Economic Observer reported on August 31.
Though some local governments in the region are keen to tap into this newfound treasure, companies are in no rush to actually begin construction.
Preferential treatment has enabled businesses to secure land at low cost and many enterprises now hoard the land in anticipation of financial and policy support, the newspaper said.
"This superficial exuberance is hardly contributing to economic growth," said Pan Jiahua, director of the Research Center for Sustainable Development at the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences.
Compared with the flirtation with novel green concepts, our vague understanding of what it takes to go green is even more problematic. That's where a realistic road map is needed.
"For us to achieve green growth in cities, we need to de-couple urbanization from urban sprawl that defines the word as we know it," Professor Zhu Dajian told the forum on Sunday. Zhu is professor of Economics and Management at Tongji University and an advisor to international organizations such as UNDP and UNEP.
Compact cities
In Zhu's trailblazing formulations on green growth, cities ought to reject the widely held notion that improvements in basic city services - living, working, transport and leisure - are predicated on a city's physical expansion.
"Some of these functions can be merged and integrated without taking up more space," said Zhu, as he called for "compact" cities. In compact cities, many resources - for example water and land - can and should be reused.
For example, Shanghai's Songjiang District plans to build a waterfront luxury hotel at the site of an abandoned quarry, while shabby warehouses lining Suzhou Creek have been converted into "creative hubs." Both are concrete examples of what Zhu called "de-coupling from the one-way, one-off and open channel of urban resource flows."
The ultimate de-coupling would, in Zhu's vision, come as a tectonic shift in our perception of what goes into making a quality life. Central to this change is a use-oriented rather than possession-oriented philosophy.
Gas guzzlers and bigger houses, the once epitomes of the American dream, have left so indelible a mark on Chinese mentality that traditional virtues like frugality are forced to take a back seat.
Cities should therefore encourage public transport and dissuade people from buying cars as status symbols.
Green was seldom considered worthy of being juxtaposed with the sanctified G-word - virtually a fetish - until 2004, when Premier Wen Jiabao announced green GDP index would replace traditional GDP index as a criterion to rate officials' performance.
Green GDP has since made its way into the Chinese official terminology and caught on as one of the most quoted - and overused - buzzwords.
Notwithstanding its official favor, the term is sometimes tossed around out of expediency, and our misguided thinking about "green GDP" is likely to lead us further down a road of ecological degradation.
Aside from bubble-causing overheated investment in green technology, pursuit of a green economy is a convenient excuse for land seizures that can in no way lead to something green and environmentally sustainable.
This was the observation of Professor Wang Jinnan, a veteran researcher on the evolution of China's green economy, during a forum on environmentally sustainable growth last Sunday.
It was part of his critique of the current investment frenzy in the green industry, now plagued by overcapacity in the solar photovoltaic and wind power sectors.
Wang is the vice president of Chinese Academy for Environmental Planning, a think tank affiliated with the Ministry of Environmental Protection.
His note of caution comes at a time when many shams disguised as green projects are calling into question whether this green drive is sustained by an authentic determination to be environmentally friendly and sustainable, or whether the drive to go green is just another incarnation of the urge to produce glowing GDP figures.
In China's vast northwest, where the sizzling Gobi Desert dominates the landscape, swarms of high-tech companies are trying to cash in on the promise of solar power generation.
Once an unlikely destination for investment, the remote deserts where few had dared to tread are now a huge source of solar energy - it gets more than 3,000 hours of bright sunlight each year, compared with Shanghai's 2,000 hours, according to the Economic Observer reported on August 31.
Though some local governments in the region are keen to tap into this newfound treasure, companies are in no rush to actually begin construction.
Preferential treatment has enabled businesses to secure land at low cost and many enterprises now hoard the land in anticipation of financial and policy support, the newspaper said.
"This superficial exuberance is hardly contributing to economic growth," said Pan Jiahua, director of the Research Center for Sustainable Development at the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences.
Compared with the flirtation with novel green concepts, our vague understanding of what it takes to go green is even more problematic. That's where a realistic road map is needed.
"For us to achieve green growth in cities, we need to de-couple urbanization from urban sprawl that defines the word as we know it," Professor Zhu Dajian told the forum on Sunday. Zhu is professor of Economics and Management at Tongji University and an advisor to international organizations such as UNDP and UNEP.
Compact cities
In Zhu's trailblazing formulations on green growth, cities ought to reject the widely held notion that improvements in basic city services - living, working, transport and leisure - are predicated on a city's physical expansion.
"Some of these functions can be merged and integrated without taking up more space," said Zhu, as he called for "compact" cities. In compact cities, many resources - for example water and land - can and should be reused.
For example, Shanghai's Songjiang District plans to build a waterfront luxury hotel at the site of an abandoned quarry, while shabby warehouses lining Suzhou Creek have been converted into "creative hubs." Both are concrete examples of what Zhu called "de-coupling from the one-way, one-off and open channel of urban resource flows."
The ultimate de-coupling would, in Zhu's vision, come as a tectonic shift in our perception of what goes into making a quality life. Central to this change is a use-oriented rather than possession-oriented philosophy.
Gas guzzlers and bigger houses, the once epitomes of the American dream, have left so indelible a mark on Chinese mentality that traditional virtues like frugality are forced to take a back seat.
Cities should therefore encourage public transport and dissuade people from buying cars as status symbols.
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