With countries from around the world set to meet in Copenhagen to try to hammer out a post-2012 climate change agreement, no one would disagree that a U.S. commitment to cut greenhouse gas emissions is essential to such a global pact. However, despite U.S. president Obama's recent announcement...

China, from its own perspective cannot afford to, and from an international perspective, is not allowed to continue on the conventional path of encouraging economic growth at the expense of the environment. The country needs to transform its economy to effectively address concern about a range...

China had been singled out by Western politicians and media for dragging its feet on international climate negotiations at Copenhagen, the accusations previously always targeted on the U.S. To put such a criticism into perspective, this paper provides some reflections on China's stance and...

The Doha Round Agenda (paragraph 31(3)) mandates to liberalize environmental goods and services. This mandate offers a good opportunity to put climate-friendly goods and services on a fast track to liberalization. Agreement on this paragraph should represent one immediate contribution that the...

As an important step towards building a "harmonious society" through "scientific development", China has incorporated for the first time in its five-year economic plan an energy input indicator as a constraint. While it achieved a quadrupling of its GDP while cutting its energy intensity by...

In what format and under what timeframe China would take on climate commitments is of significant relevance to China because it is facing great pressure both inside and outside international climate negotiations to exhibit greater ambition and is being confronted with the threats of trade...

Just prior to the Copenhagen climate summit, China pledged to cut its carbon intensity by 40-45% by 2020 relative to its 2005 levels to help to reach an international climate change agreement at Copenhagen or beyond. This raises the issue of whether such a pledge is ambitious or just represents...

The climate-trade nexus gains increasing attention as governments are taking great efforts to forge a post-2012 climate change regime to succeed the Kyoto Protocol. This raises the issues of the scope of trade-related measures and of when and how they could be used. This paper discusses how far...