The ongoing 2025 Shanghai International Carbon Neutrality Expo in Technologies, Products, and Achievements is geared towards providing Chinese enterprises with practical solutions to overcome challenges in the global expansion of their green products. The three-day expo at the Shanghai New International Expo Center showcases a variety of forums and trade matchmaking sessions, while presenting a diverse array of cutting-edge green and low-carbon technologies.
A key highlight at the expo is Shanghai Technology Exchange's latest product, which provides quick valuations for enterprises' green technologies using big data. Qualifying technologies are highlighted in green, and their real-time valuations are displayed. "This product enables quick valuations for green technologies and fosters connections with financial and trading scenarios, thereby facilitating synergy between the green financial system and the industrial system," said Jiang Chen, assistant to the president of Shanghai Technology Exchange. Shanghai Technology Exchange has previously facilitated over 10 billion yuan (around 1.4 billion U.S. dollars) in intellectual property pledge financing, with a significant portion involving green technologies. This latest product establishes a dedicated green-tech financing platform. Spanning an area of 40,000 square meters, the expo has attracted the participation of over 300 well-known enterprises from 15 countries and regions, including Germany, the Netherlands, Japan, Sweden, Spain, and Britain.
Carbon Neutrality Expo in Shanghai propels China's green tech for global expansion
Chinese President Xi Jinping's New Year message delivered on the New Year Eve has drawn positive responses from scholars and former officials from several countries, who say that the series of global initiatives proposed by Xi have provided fresh momentum for multilateralism and shared development at a time of growing uncertainty.
While the reactions touched on the broader vision outlined in Xi's New Year message, they also focused on the initiatives Xi has put forward over recent years, particularly the Global Development Initiative, the Global Security Initiative, the Global Civilization Initiative and the newly proposed Global Governance Initiative.
Highlighting the significant importance of these initiatives, they have emphasized the need for equality, inclusiveness and a fairer international order.
"We need a more just international order and a truly multilateral system. China stands almost alone today as a global force actively advancing genuine multilateralism. Therefore, these initiatives are most welcome," said Michael Schumann, chairman of the German Federal Association for Economic Development and Foreign Trade.
Former Lebanese Prime Minister Hassan Diab has placed the emphasis on dialogue and trust-building between civilizations.
"It is essential now more than ever to promote communication and understanding between China and the world to enhance cultural exchanges and build mutual trust. As President Xi has repeatedly emphasized, China supports principles of unity, inclusiveness and peacefulness. These values should guide our collective efforts to build bridges rather than walls," he said.
From a governance perspective, Russian scholar Ekaterina Zaklyazminskaya, head of the Center for World Politics and Strategic Analysis at the Institute of China and Modern Asia under the Russian Academy of Sciences, has viewed the Global Governance Initiative as a structured response to global challenges.
"The recently proposed Global Governance Initiative presents a comprehensive framework of ideas. It prioritizes establishing a more just international order, champions multilateralism, and upholds the principle of 'people first.' Through its concrete practices, financial assistance, and tangible support for multilateral bodies like the U.N., China has demonstrated that its commitments are substantive. China is taking tangible steps toward a fairer and more reasonable global governance system," she said.
Scholars from the Global South also have seen historical echoes in the initiatives.
"Some of the developed and developing countries have highly welcomed the Global Development Initiative, because this initiative emphasizes the need for partnerships -- partnerships that commit resources to end global poverty and pursue common and shared development. The Global Governance Initiative, in my view, echoes again the call that was made by Asian [and] African countries at the Bandung Conference in 1955 for equality, for mutual respect, for respect of territorial integrity, [and] for respect of sovereignty," said Bongani Maimele, director of international relations at South Africa's National School of Government.
"These initiatives are revolutionary in nature. They are reshaping the political philosophy of global governance. Today's world is far more complex than it was 80 years ago, and interdependence among nations has deepened. Therefore, we need new philosophical perspectives to examine our world and new models of engagement to foster a new type of international relations," said Sheradil Baktygulov, director of Kyrgyzstan's Institute of World Policy.
Int'l scholars praise Xi's initiatives, call for stronger multilateralism
