Steven Chu, who faces confirmation hearings in the Senate today, is widely recognized as one of the world’s leading authorities on renewable energy. But less known is the fact that he presents the United States with a unique opportunity to make progress in its ongoing dialogue with China on climate change (see for example this commentary on UPI Asia).
Once again the G8 has come up tragically short on climate change and a host of urgent problems affecting poor people in developing countries. The good news is that they are at least discussing the right topics. The first Hokkaido G8 document, on the World Economy spills lots of ink on relations between rich and developing economies, including for example, reaffirmation of support for the Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative.
Last month, I reported on the first public release of China's Export-Import Bank's environmental policy and suggested that China's overtures of increased transparency might present an opportunity for other donors to engage China in a more cooperative partnership. It seems the International Financial Corp. (IFC), the World Bank branch for private sector lending, is doing just that.
China's Export-Import Bank is a large and growing instrument of China's strategy in boosting trade and investment (and influence) abroad. As Todd Moss and I noted, it is now among the largest export credit agencies in the world, with primary commercial operations in 2005 exceeding those of the U.S., Japan and the UK.
Today the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) released the first part of its long-awaited Fourth Assessment Report. This is a major event, because the Report strengthens the scientific consensus about the threat from global warming if we don't curb greenhouse gas emissions.
Twenty years ago this month I left China under less than ideal circumstances: I was one of a handful of reporters expelled during a crackdown on the incipient student democracy movement. After a dozen years of close involvement with China, first as a student, then as a tour guide, and finally as a journalist, I was suddenly cut off from the country, unable to return.
The flurry of news about China and Africa is reaching a peak as the November 3-5 Beijing Summit gets underway. There is little doubt that effusive pledges of solidarity and good old cash will be forthcoming in abundance. And it is also patently clear that China has every intention of continuing to ramp up its activities in Africa; look no further than China's official "Africa Policy" released last January.
Richard B. Freeman from Harvard University and NBER Centre for Economic Performance, London School of Economics gave a presentation on the expanding global workforce on November 8.