Sustainable development: a prominent problem in 2008

Special Report:Yearender

2008

by He Jing, Yang Jun

BEIJING, Dec. 22 (Chinese media) -- The year 2008 has

witnessed a fluctuation in global oil prices, grave food supply problems,

natural catastrophes, continued deterioration of environment and the unfolding

global financial crisis.

The cascade of crises has posed severe challenges for

sustainable development and has topped the agenda of nearly all high-level

meetings in 2008, from the World Economic Forum in Dovas in January, the Group

of Eight (G8) Summit in Hokkaido, Japan, to the 7th Asian-European Meeting in

Beijing.

FROM FOOD TO LIVING

The intractable issue of climate change showed no

signs of easing in 2008 as a major snow storm wrecked southern China, tropical

storm Erin lashed Texas, the United States, Hurricane Felix struck Central

America and a cyclone claimed 70,000 lives in Myanmar.

The number of natural calamities in the world, due

partly to global warming, has quadrupled in the past two decades, a UN study

said.

The world suffered about 120 natural disasters per

year in the early 1980s, compared with the current figure of about 500.

WHO Director-General Dr Margaret Chan said at this

year's World Health Day that climate change endangers health in fundamental

ways.

In the long run, climate change can also have

consequences such as water shortages, a deterioration in living conditions, an

increase in economic losses, and a sea level rise.

Climate change has also taken a toll on the global

food supply, triggering a continued increase in the number of hungry people

across the world. The number of people plagued by hunger increased to 925

million from the 850 million last year, the UN Food and Agriculture Organization

said.

Some 37 countries currently face a food crisis,

sparking tensions and social conflicts. Riots and demonstrations first broke out

in Latin America and then spread to the African continent and Southeast Asia.

According to a confidential World Bank report

obtained by the British Guardian newspaper, plant fuels have played a

"significant" part in pushing food prices to record levels.

The "Strategy for Biofuels" adopted by Europe and the

United States to boost significantly the production of fuels from agricultural

raw materials diverted enormous amounts of grains into fuel and drove up food

prices around the world.

Carbon dioxide emissions in industrialized countries

that partly contributed to climate changes were also blamed for the grain output

reduction.

OVERCONSUMPTION TRIGGERS ENVIRONMENTAL

CRISIS

The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change said

human activity is a major causal factor of global climate change.

Ever since the industrial revolution, human

activities, especially the massive consumption of energy and resources by

developed countries, have increased atmospheric concentrations of greenhouse

gases, produced conspicuous impacts on the natural ecosystems of the Earth and

endangered the survival and development of human society.

America, though accounting for only 5 percent of the

world's population, consumes 26 percent of the world's energy and serves as a

typical example of over consumption.

"The human population is now so large that the amount

of resources needed to sustain it exceeds what is available," the United Nations

Environment Program said in its Global Environment Outlook report.

The endeavor to ensure sustainable development was

also dampened by the ongoing global financial slump, which delayed some green

energy projects and stoked fears that a shortage of investment money would lead

to cheap and dirty decisions on new power plants, said Yvo de Boer, executive

secretary of the U.N. Framework Convention on Climate Change,

Investors, however, should see the crisis as "an

opportunity for green growth" as they replace up to 40 percent of the world's

power generation over the next decade, de Boer said.

In general, major threats to the planet such as climate change, the rate of extinction of species and the challenge of feeding a growing population are among the many that remain unresolved, and all of them put humanity at risk.

BALANCE BETWEEN DEVELOPMENT, ENVIRONMENTAL

PROTECTION

The leaders at the G8 Hokkaido Toyako Summit agreed

that enhanced commitments or actions by all major economies are essential for

taming climate change.

"We recognize that what the major developed economies

do will differ from what major developing economies do, consistent with the

principle of common but differentiated responsibilities and respective

capabilities," said a declaration endorsed at the end of the summit.

The Seventh Asia-Europe Meeting, in its Beijing

Declaration on Sustainable Development, reiterated that sustainable development

bears on the present and future of mankind, the very existence and development

of all nations, world peace and prosperity. "All nations should, whilst pursuing

economic development, strive to maintain environment quality and take full

account of the needs of future generations."

At the two-day meeting, Chinese President Hu Jintao

urged all parties concerned to observe principles and provisions of the UN

Framework Convention on Climate Change and the Kyoto Protocol, particularly the

principle of common but differentiated responsibilities and respective

capabilities, and to implement the decisions of the Bali Action Plan on taming

climate change.

Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao said in November that in

the process of industrialization and urbanization, greater emphasis should be

placed on advancing the transformation of economic development mode and economic

restructuring and encouraging production methods and consumption mode that help

conserve energy and resources,

In face of the challenges to sustainable development,

no single country can maintain its own integrity and address them alone. To

strike a balance between economic development and environmental protection, all

countries should work together through dialogue and coordination in order to

realize a mutually beneficial and win-win result and harmonious development.

"The commingled problems of climate change, economic

growth and the environment suggest their own solution. Only sustainable

development -- a global embrace of green growth -- offers the world, rich

countries as well as poor, an ensuring prospect of long-term social well-being

and prosperity," UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said recently.