Guests:

- Dermot O'Gorman, Country Representative of WWF China;

- Dr.R.K.Pachauri, chair of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change;

- Yang Fuqiang, Director of WWF Global Climate Change Solutions

- Anthea Webb, director of the United Nations World Food Program in China;

- Xu Xiaojie, director of Overseas Investment Institute at the China National Petroleum Corporation’s Academy of Economics and Technology Research.

Hello and welcome to the Main Talk. 2008 was a year full of challenges. In addition to the worst global financial crisis in 60 years, environment threats, food shortages and energy issues have placed extra pressure on the world. Here is a look back at these international situations the world had to face in 2008.

March

The first round of United Nations climate change talks in 2008 were held in Bangkok. They discussed the financial and technological support for developing countries in tackling climate change. Increasingly businesses began to realize that climate change does not have to be a threat. It can be an opportunity.

2008 Climate Change Talks

 Qin: You’ve said that what’s good for environment is also good for business. What do you mean by that?

Dermot O'Gorman (Country Representative of WWF China): One is the growing amount of companies going into renewable energy, so wind farms and stuff like that. These companies who, only a few years ago, were very small, but now becoming multi-million, a hundred-million-dollar companies as they set up very big operations, tapping into a growing market and the demand for renewable, low carbon energy. The other one is where companies can increase efficiency throughout the supply chain and the production chain. For example, we are working with the Coca-Cola Company here. Their CEO and chairman made a pledge to be water-neutral. That means they will be increasing the efficiency use of the water. They will also be recycling the water, so is to put back clean water back into the environment.

June

The divergences between the poor and rich countries are obvious. At the second round of climate change talks in Bonn, Germany, the United States rejected the Kyoto Protocol with the reasoning that developing countries should bear more responsibility in decreasing greenhouse gases. China and many other developing countries were accused of heavy emissions.

Qin: We often hear a term called “embodied energy”. So what is it, really? And why is it relevant here?

O'Gorman: It’s a term, which is still reasonably new, not only in China, but in the rest of the world as well. But it talks about the amount of energy in the production chain to produce a certain product. So if you are producing a refrigerator, for example, the amount of energy that goes in to producing steel, to producing, manufacturing and putting it together, to shipping it to the customer, to all those aspects are called “embodied energy” to make a finish product. The energy that China uses provides those goods to other countries. So some of China’s emissions are in fact as a result of providing a product to a country like America.

Qin: Can we say that, to a certain degree, China is actually paying the cost of pollution for some of the developed countries that consume “made in China” products? Is it fair to say that?

O'Gorman: We released a report just before the Bali Coop, which was such a high profile during China and the rest world. It shows that perhaps up to 25% of Chinese energy use is going on providing products for other developed countries.

 July

The G8 nations set a long-term target for reducing 50% of greenhouse gases by 2050 with other participants in UN talks, but refused to set mid-term goals with numerical targets. Due to their refusal, the G8 was accused of avoiding historical responsibilities.

R. K. Pachauri (Chair of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change): We have a very high concentration of green house gases in the outside atmosphere. This has happened as a result of accumulative emissions of greenhouse gases by whom largely the developed countries. I think it’s for the developed countries to take the first steps, but what have they done so far? Zero! 1992 was the year when the framework I mentioned on climate change was agreed to. We are now in 2008. 16 years have gone by, what has been our record globally of reducing emissions of greenhouse gases? Pitiable, that’s what the answer would be.

Qin: But the counter argument is that the way we develop our economies today shouldn’t be the same as 50 years ago coz everything changes.

Pachauri: Firstly, I think the developed countries have obviously not asking to do anything. They’ve done nothing. They’ve done absolutely nothing compared to what they’ve required. But the part I would educate for our country is one that put the nature first. We cannot grow, we cannot consume more, we cannot produce more if we are depleting the resources of nature.

Latest

The 2008 Climate Change Conference was held in Poznan, Poland. It discussed mid-term and long-term commitments to curb emissions.

Yang Fuqiang (Director, Global Climate Change Solutions, WWF International): I and my colleague just come back from Poznan, Poland. We had a very wonderful time there. Generally speaking about Poznan conference, we are very disappointed because we didn’t get big progress. Some developed countries in the NX One, they didn’t report what their goal in the 2020 because they say they say they haven’t decided what goal they have to raise.

Due to many green projects relying financially on investment banks and hedge funds, many worry about the green process in 2009.

Yang: The financial crisis have a very short impact on the climate change issues. But we still understand that financial crisis is sort of an issue, but climate change in the needs of great many years effort.

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