China to cut per unit GDP cost by half
(Xinhua)
Updated: 2006-03-02 15:35

Anxious about its expanding energy consumption, China now plans to hack down its energy costs per unit of gross domestic product (GDP) by 50 to 60 percent by 2010.

Its annual report on sustainable development, released by the Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS), a major think tank for China's central government, on Wednesday says the country should strive for more efficient and balanced growth.

The Academy has conducted a national study to measure efficiencies of energy and resources by using a comprehensive index, which incorporates assessment of ten kinds of major resources and pollutants. The lower the index value, the more favorable efficiency it indicates.

Statistics from the report show the index has dropped annually by 4.9 percent on average between 1980 and 2003 in China, indicating that energy and resource efficiencies are gradually improving and that less pollutants were discharged in the China over the years.

However, there was a smaller drop rate in the index in the late 1990s and a rebound in 2003, which according to the report augurs a bleaker future for the country as it tries to improve resources and environmental performance in the next five years.

In a CAS appraisal of China's 31 provinces, autonomous regions and municipalities using the index, Shanghai municipality in east China topped the list as the most efficient energy user and Shanxi Province in north China was at the bottom, the report said.

The result suggests that there is a big gap between the affluent east China regions and the underdeveloped west in terms of energy consumption efficiency. Eleven of the 13 least efficient provinces, autonomous regions and municipalities are located in the west, according to the report.

In another study waged by the CAS, 59 countries, who altogether account for 96 percent of the world's GDP in 2003, were appraised for energy and resources efficiency.

China ranked 56th, making it one of the most inefficient energy consumers in the world, the report said, adding that "compared with other countries, China remains an energy-intensive economy."

China's economy surged 9.9 percent last year, according to government accounting, the highest among the major economies in the world. This growth, nevertheless, was achieved at the expense of the environment.

The academy has been issuing annual reports on sustainable development since 1998.