The cooperation between China and the European Union significantly contributes to global efforts to address climate change, according to climate experts.
On Thursday, Chinese and EU leaders issued a joint statement on climate change in Beijing after the 25th China-EU Summit co-chaired by Chinese Premier Li Qiang, President of the European Council Antonio Costa and President of the European Commission Ursula von der Leyen.
In an interview with China Global Television Network (CGTN), Dimitri de Boer, Director for China of ClientEarth, noted that the agreement means that the two sides can rise above tensions and conflict to work together and achieve the ambitious goals set in the Paris Agreement.
"This agreement is significant in the sense that it shows that climate action continues. It doesn't stop despite what some leaders would want to make us believe. And it means that the EU and China can rise above global tensions to deal with the bigger issues, and climate change is a really big issue. So it's very important to do this and the targets must be aligned with the temperature goals of the Paris Agreement, and that is something that was reflected in this joint statement. And it's very important because the temperature goals of the Paris Agreement are quite ambitious. And so that means that both sides will need to quickly reduce emissions to actually be able to achieve that," he said.
The director also highlighted China's progress in prompting green development.
"China has moved so fast in the last few years on solar, winds, batteries and electric vehicles and these technologies must become widely available around the world to make the climate transition work. And so in the past, sometimes the EU has spoken about 'overcapacity' in China. In our view, though, in these green technologies there's no 'overcapacity' because the world needs these technologies so badly, and has committed to triple, for example, renewable energy deployment by 2030," he said.
Arvea Marieni, the EU Climate Pact Ambassador, also noted that the statement serves as a positive sign of innovation and cooperation, especially in fraught times.
"Climate change is truly a global challenge and cannot be solved individually, neither by countries, nor couples or groups of countries together. But the cooperation between China and the European Union has helped enormously to overcome some difficulties, especially last year [at the COP29 summit] in Baku. China was openly praised by the European Union negotiators for stepping beyond the traditional approaches, for instance, when it refers to climate financing," she said.
"I think it is very important and especially in very fraught times as we are in today, with so much going on in terms of geopolitical confrontations and even the fact that a joint statement was the outcome of this important meeting today is already a positive sign. Of course, it doesn't solve all the problems and the real facts of war, confrontations, economic conflict or [other] issues remain in the background and need to be addressed to really find a solution," she said.
China-EU cooperation contributes to addressing climate change: experts
