Source: Xinhua    Published: 2017-6-15

China is poised to pilot green financing reform in its latest effort to honor commitments on addressing climate change, as decided at the Wednesday executive meeting chaired by Premier Li Keqiang.

While in Europe earlier this month, Li reaffirmed that China would stand by its commitments made to the Paris Agreement and join forces with other parties to address the challenges of climate change.

"China is among the first countries to ratify the Paris Agreement, and you can bank on it that we will stick to our commitments," Li said in Berlin on June 1 at a joint press conference with German Chancellor Angela Merkel.

This is a global call and the consensus is there. Doing what is commensurate with China`s role as the largest developing country is not only an international responsibility, but also a true calling for China in our path forward, the premier said.

"China always stands by its words and sees them through. Our efforts in energy conservation and emission control will only be strengthened, not weakened," he said.

China`s CO2 emission per unit of GDP dropped by 26.2 percent from 2011 to 2016 and the country is on course to cut emission intensity down to 40-45 percent below 2005 level by 2020, and further to 60-65 percent lower than 2005 by 2030, when overall carbon emission of China peaks.

To ensure that the country will meet its target, the Chinese government has taken a host of measures, the most recent being the green financing pilot program.

Ma Jun, chief economist with the research bureau of the People`s Bank of China, said last September that China`s pledges to bring carbon emissions to a peak by around 2030 would need investment of 3-4 trillion yuan each year.

Ma said the government is to cover around 15 percent of the total, which means that social capital would have to be mobilized on a massive scale.

"There has been a high consensus ranging from the top decision-making level to the government departments related to support the country`s green financing and investment and to speed up the transformation of the economy to a greener way of development," he said.