Foreign Ministry Spokesperson Zhao Lijian’s Regular Press Conference on August 31, 2020
Beijing Daily:
US Secretary of State Pompeo tweeted on August 29 that “Too much of the Chinese Communist Party’s economy is built on willful disregard for air, land, and water quality. The Chinese people-and the world-deserve better.” He added China is responsible for nearly 30% of global plastic pollution and is the largest emitter of mercury, marine debris and greenhouse gases. Do you have any comment?
Zhao Lijian:
Mr. Pompeo should carefully examine himself in the mirror and have a retrospect of why the US has pulled out of the Paris Agreement.
The Chinese government attaches high importance to environmental protection and has incorporated ecological progress into the five-sphere integrated plan for the cause of socialism with Chinese characteristics. Believing that a sound ecological environment benefits the well-being of all people, the Chinese government has made strenuous efforts to promote green, low-carbon and sustainable development and implemented action plans to prevent and control air, water and soil pollution with significant results. In the international arena, China has earnestly fulfilled its obligations under the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, the Paris Agreement, the Basel Convention, the Minamata Convention on Mercury, among others. We made positive contributions to global environmental governance.
In 2018, China’s carbon dioxide emissions per unit of GDP was down by 45.8 percent from its 2005 level, equivalent to a reduction of 5.26 billion tons of carbon dioxide. China invests more in renewable energy than any other country, with the number of new energy vehicles accounting for more than half of the world’s total. As early as in 2008, China imposed restrictions on the use of plastic bags to promote recycling of plastic waste. By the end of 2019, nearly 99 percent of the country’s urban household waste were safely disposed of. China’s coastal cities all have garbage classification and marine sanitation mechanisms, and they have actively carried out beach and marine garbage clean-up activities. Regulations on the Safety Management of Hazardous Chemicals, the 13th five-year plan for ecological and environmental protection and other regulations and policies have been promulgated, in which the objectives, paths and measures for the prevention and control of mercury pollution were determined.
In contrast, the US, as the country with the largest cumulative emissions of greenhouse gases in the world, hasn’t ratified the Kyoto Protocol and has pulled out of the Paris Agreement. It has also denied binding quantified emission reduction targets, dissociated itself from the global system and arrangement of carbon emissions, seriously hindered the global process of emission reduction and green development. At the same time, as the world’s largest exporter of solid waste and a major country of per capita plastic consumption, the US refuses to ratify the Basel Convention and has set obstacles for the global governance process of plastic waste. It has transferred a lot of waste to developing countries, bringing great harm to the local and global environment. I think it is clear to everyone which country shows willful disregard for the global environment and the health of people around the world.
