Asian Productivity Organization Secretary General Mr. Mari Amano,
Members of the foreign diplomatic corps in the ROC,
Representatives of APO member nations,
Guests from overseas,
Vice Minister of Economic Affairs Mr. Shih-Chao Cho (卓士昭),
Vice Minister of Foreign Affairs Vanessa Yea-Ping Shih (史亞平),
Senior Advisor of Green Trade Project Office Mr. Tain-Jy Chen (陳添枝),
Chairman of Taiwan External Trade Development Council Dr. Chih-Kang Wang (王志剛),
Good evening, everyone!
Those of you in this audience will be quite aware that countries around the world have adopted a wide range of environmental policies to deal with global warming and climate change. Also, since the global financial crisis of 2008, countries have been focusing on green growth as a new engine for global economic development.
Climate change has had a very clear impact on the global economy. This includes a substantive change in many things, including international trade. Trade has become a key factor influencing the amount of carbon dioxide emissions, and environmental issues have become a major focus of WTO negotiations. In APEC, meanwhile, trade ministers have agreed that tariffs on a list of 54 environmental goods will be reduced to 5% or less by the year 2015.
In addition, many countries have adopted strict environmental regulations to promote the green economy and green employment. For example, the European Union has adopted the Europe 2020 strategy, under which it aims to reduce CO2 emissions by 20% and generate at least 20% of its power from renewable energy by 2020. And the United Nations Environment Programme has called on the G-20 economies to invest at least 1 percent of GDP into green economic sectors, to include energy efficiency, renewable energy technologies, and sustainable transport.
Meanwhile, the United States announced that over 95% of all products and services purchased through government procurement must be eco-friendly. The United Kingdom has adopted a "Green Deal" policy to encourage home owners to make their existing homes more energy-efficient. In addition, the UK has been tightening its building regulations to ensure that all new homes built in England in 2016 or later will be zero-carbon structures. In Asia, South Korea has been aggressively pursuing a "Green Growth" policy since 2009.
After I took office in 2008 as president of this country, the Republic of China also announced the Sustainable Energy Policy Guidelines, which require national emissions of carbon dioxide to be reduced to the level of 2005 by 2020, and to the level of 2000 by 2025. We have actually achieved the level of 2005, and just for your information, when I took office in 2008, Taiwan's population was 23 million, or less than 0.3% of the world's population, but the carbon emissions of Taiwan at that time were roughly 1% of world emissions. But now, this level has been reduced to 0.84%. So we have made a big effort to increase our energy efficiency by 2% every year. This is how we have managed to reduce our carbon emissions so much. But still, as the economy continues to grow, it is certainly getting more difficult to reduce carbon dioxide. We will continue to work in this area, to tighten restrictions. As you know, the Republic of China lost its representation in the United Nations back in 1971, so we have been unable to participate in all the activities of the United Nations itself, only in its specialized agencies. We are therefore not a party to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), or to the Kyoto Protocol. But this government has been very serious about keeping our standards compliant with the UN standards. We have not been able to attend the meetings of the UNFCCC, and we have to send NGOs from Taiwan to get needed information for our policy making. But we've been trying everything possible to establish a green economy. Two years ago, we changed all our traffic lights to LED bulbs. We are the second country in the world to do that. The next step is to change all the street lights to LED bulbs. This is something we will continue to promote. When I was the mayor of Taipei City, we attached a lot of importance to sorting and recycling of waste, and after eight years of very hard work, we were able to reduce per capita waste from 1.1 kg to 0.4 kg, a reduction of more than 65%. And now the whole country has reached that level, so those of you who visited the World Expo in Shanghai in 2010 might remember that the Taipei pavilion actually focused on our accomplishment in this area—the reduction of trash in Taipei City. Much to my satisfaction, when I was mayor, a landfill could be filled fully in about five years, but after we started the trash reduction program, we were able to continue to use the existing landfill because the incoming trash every day was only about 10% of what it had been years earlier. That enabled us to use the landfill another 20 years. So this was a remarkable accomplishment in terms of the disposal of waste, and this is something we continue to work on. In this city, you might have a chance to visit some of the neighborhoods and see people with bags in their hands. Once the trash truck comes, they will empty their bags into the truck. They are required not to leave the trash out for the collectors to pick up. This is something we've been very successful with.
I really want to extend to you a very warm welcome to come to Taipei to attend this wonderful occasion. I understand that some of you have tried very hard to show us how much we have all accomplished together. I hope you will enjoy the reception. And last but not least, during your stay in this country I hope you will take advantage of your precious time to visit two places. The first is our National Palace Museum, to see the wonderful collections and art treasures of our past 3,000 years. The second type of place you should visit is our night markets, to see the modern life of Taiwan. During your visit, please, do as much shopping as possible to help our economy recover.
Thank you very much.