Expert urges making ecosystem product tradable

A leading environmental expert has called Chinese government to establish a system to make ecosystem product tradable to further promote green development in the country.

Wang Jinnan, a member with the Chinese Academy of Engineering, made the comment in a policy paper released by the China Council for International Cooperation on Environment and Development, a high-level international advisory body, on Friday.

His research team suggested that the Chinese government should price ecosystem products and promote the trade of them during the 14th Five-Year Plan period (2021-2025), he said while delivering a speech as the head of the team that studied Ecological Compensation and Green Development Institutional Reform in the Yangtze River Economic Belt.

The government "should establish a system for ecological capital accounting, which could help guarantee value realization of ecosystem product, and make a top-level policy design for that", he said Wang is also president of the Chinese Academy of Environmental Planning.

Ecosystem products can be any factors in the environment that guarantee safety of the ecosytem and operation of the system's function. It also includes those factors that comprise a good living environment for the human beings, such as fresh air, clean water and pleasant climate.

"A two-way conversion channel" should be established between "lucid waters and lush mountains" and "invaluable assets", he added.

"Lucid waters and lush mountains are invaluable assets" is an assertion initiated in 2005 by President Xi Jinping when he was the Party chief of Zhejiang province.

He said the Ministry of Ecology and Environment has already drafted a guideline on accounting of gross ecosystem product, or GEP. Based on this guideline, the country should set up a standardized system for GEP accounting to help develop ecosystem products and services.

The team also suggested regulating the rights to use, benefit from and transfer the possession of ecosystem products while exploring differentiated management mechanisms for different types of the products in different regions, he said.

Wang said the government should also encourage financing institutions to explore funding ways based on value of ecosystem products and help leverage funds to help enhance environmental protection and governance.

The trade of ecosystem products and services is still new in China, but there have been successful examples. In Lishui, Zhejiang province, for example, State Power Investment Cooperation and Dayang township in the city have reached a deal.

According to a news release on the website of Zhejiang government, the company reached agreement with local government to invest 170 million yuan ($25 million) in building a photovoltaic power generation project in the township in May and it will pay a local collectively-owned enterprise about 2.8 million yuan to buy local ecosystem product that favors power generation.

The money will be paid to the collective business because the excellent local ecosystem and environment could help State Power Investment Cooperation gain comparatively larger economic benefits, the release said.

It said the service time of the batteries with the photovoltaic power generation system could be extended for almost five years in the excellent local environment that features good air quality and low frequency of acid rains.

The high intensity of light radiation in the area is also expected to help generate 10 percent more electricity, it added.