The co-benefits of progress-- Beijing Review

Beijing Review: President Xi regularly uses the phrase "green is gold," which means that environmental protection and healthy ecosystems can also bring economic benefits. How do you see the relationship between China's economy and its environment?

Erik Solheim: Every nation that has been really successful in fighting environmental destruction has done it by focusing on the co-benefit: How can we grow the economy and take care of the environment all at the same time?

In the past, you couldn't really grow the economy without an environmental cost because coal was the only available energy. But now, solar power is the cheapest energy in the world. If you go from coal to solar, you save money while bringing better health and better environment to the people.

That is the underpinning understanding of the Chinese environmental policies today that will bring prosperity to China while taking care of Mother Earth at the same time.

Maybe the best example is that of the electric vehicle industry. China didn't have a very well-known brand in the old [internal combustion car] industry. There was no Chinese anything similar to Toyota. Everyone in the world knows Toyota. No one at the time knew a Chinese brand for gasoline cars. China decided to leapfrog from the old cars into electric cars and now China is exporting more cars than any other nation in the world.

BYD is the biggest electric car brand in the world and about 10 different Chinese brands are making electric cars. China accounts for 60 percent of the global market for electric cars. If China had stayed in the old days of gasoline cars, economic prosperity coming from electric cars would have been impossible.

Of course this has been an enormously positive development for the planet, introducing electric cars at scale.

So what opportunities can China's green development bring for international cooperation?

Solheim: Number one is to bring this enormous power of Chinese industries, because China is by far the nation with the greatest industrial ecosystem anywhere in the world. China has a very educated working class and a lot of enterprises in basically every environmental industry.

Tongwei and LONGi are the biggest solar energy companies in the world. CATL is the biggest electric battery company in the world. Goldwind and Sinovel are the biggest wind turbine manufacturers in the world. And I could go on and on. If these companies are investing abroad, they will create jobs in other parts of the world, while bringing environmental technology.

Let me add that China is also the biggest nation in terms of nature conservation—protection of animals like the giant panda or its national park scheme, which is now the biggest in the world. So China can bring expertise to the world. China can bring investment in the green sectors to other parts of the world.

How do you think traditional or ancient Chinese thought has influenced the country's current approach to the relationship between the environment and the economy?

Zhang Ye: Traditional Chinese culture contains rich ecological wisdom. It is an important feature of President Xi's vision on ecological progress to inherit and creatively develop excellent traditional Chinese ecological thought.

Let me take the concept of tianrenheyi as an example. Meaning "heaven and humans are united as one," tianrenheyi is a main worldview further developed by different schools of traditional Chinese thought, such as Confucianism and Taoism.

"Heaven" can be understood as the entirety of nature, manifesting certain laws and order. There are opposites and contradictions, as well as interconnections and interdependencies between humans and nature.

Humans need to continuously increase their understanding of nature, identify and resolve contradictions, and ultimately achieve and maintain a harmonious and sustainable relationship with nature.

This notion of dialectical unity stands in stark contrast to either/or dualism in which humans and nature are purely separate or even opposed. The "human domination of nature" that emerges from this dualism and the long-term practice of anthropocentrism in many Western societies are arguably the root causes of the ecological turmoil we face today.

Drawing on the tianrenheyi concept and integrating a Marxist understanding of "community," President Xi initially proposed the concept of "a community of life for humans and nature" at the Leaders Summit on Climate in April 2021.

The concept calls for the economy and the environment not to be seen as always in conflict, and for economic activities to be conducted with respect for nature.

It has now become an important principle for ecological progress in China, according to which economic activities should be carried out based on respecting and following the way of nature.

Environmental conservation and economic progress should not be seen as a contradiction in terms. Instead, by finding ways to resolve the contradictions, a win-win situation for both ecological conservation and high-quality development can be achieved.

So you're saying that as opposed to trying to dominate nature, China has sought, and seeks, to achieve harmony with it. But given China's ambitious economic goals, is harmony achievable? How does the government plan to achieve both?

Zhang: Ambitious economic goals are proposed along with unprecedented determination and action to pursue ecological progress. Achieving harmony, however, is not a one-time thing. It is not like a goal that, once achieved, our work is done forever. Rather, it is a continuous and long-term process. New contradictions will continue to emerge, requiring new goals and tasks to be set. The key is to achieve a dynamic balance between multiple tasks through constant effort. And this is no easy thing, particularly for China, which has a huge population and a vast and complex geography.

The Chinese Government understands that the pursuit of ecological progress should be carried out in phases. Based on a summary of experiences in previous phases, new strategies and goals have been set in the Outline of the 14th Five-Year Plan (2021-25) for National Economic and Social Development and Vision 2035 of the People's Republic of China.

They are further localized and specified in the plans of local governments at all levels.

Under China's new development philosophy that envisions innovative, coordinated, green, open and shared development, a series of undertakings have been laid out systematically, including continuously adjusting and optimizing the economic structure, further promoting ecological restoration and prevention of pollution, formulating stricter laws and regulations on environmental protection, and reforming the ecological supervision and assessment system.