Green Mountains as Neighbors with Water (Chinese Modernization Face to Face (11)) - How to understand that respecting, conforming to and protecting nature is an inherent requirement for building a modern socialist country in an all-round way?
Nature is the basic condition for the survival and development of human beings. From the perspective of the long evolutionary history of human beings, human beings come from nature, and continue to evolve in the process of understanding, using and transforming nature, becoming the only intelligent life in nature that can create civilization. Man is a part of nature and must follow the laws of nature on the whole, but people have subjective initiative, conforming to nature can better promote human development, and violating nature will be countered and retaliated. After entering modernization, human beings have greatly improved their ability to use and transform nature with the power of science and technology, creating unprecedented civilization achievements, but once uncontrolled development and plunder have caused serious ecological environmental trauma and swallowed the evil consequences of destroying nature. History and reality show that only the modernization of the correct handling of the relationship between man and nature is the modernization of the sustainable development of human civilization.
Building a beautiful China is a fundamental plan for the Chinese nation to contribute to the present and benefit the future, and is an important goal of building a modern socialist country in an all-round way. Since the 18th National Congress of the Communist Party of China, our Party has strengthened ecological environmental protection with unprecedented strength, carried out a series of pioneering work, and achieved unprecedented determination, intensity and results, the construction of ecological civilization has undergone historic, turning and overall changes from theory to practice, and the construction of a beautiful China has taken major strides. Facing the future, in continuing to promote the journey of modernization, China will not only not follow the old path of "pollution first and then treatment", let alone take the pathological road of "you pollute and I profit", but take a new path of green development, and at the same time strive to promote the sustainable development of the world, solve the problems brought by industrial civilization, provide Chinese wisdom for the protection of the earth's home, and demonstrate the responsibility of a major country.
Man and nature live in harmony
Nature has given birth to all life and species, provided basic conditions for the emergence and development of human civilization, and is the mother of life and the foundation of civilization. Human beings who treat nature well will receive nature's gifts and promote the development of civilization, otherwise they will be punished by nature and even destroy the achievements of civilization. For example, in the ancient Babylonian civilization, legend has it that such a breathtaking miracle as the "hanging garden" was created, which became a shining landmark building in the ancient civilization. But then the destruction of the ecological environment led to the decline of ancient Babylonian civilization, and the "hanging garden" was eventually lost in the yellow sand. Man and nature are the community of life, and protecting nature is the source of human life.
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Sky Garden
Sky Garden，又称悬苑，是古代世界七大奇迹之一。传说是公元前6世纪由新巴比伦王国的尼布甲尼撒二世在巴比伦城附近修建。据说Sky Garden采用立体造园手法，将花园放在4层平台之上，用沥青及砖块建成，平台由25米高的柱子支撑，并且有灌溉系统，园中种植各种花草树木，远看犹如花园悬在半空中，由此得名Sky Garden。
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The 27th United Nations Climate Change Conference was held in Sharm el-Sheikh, Egypt
From 6 to 18 November 2022, the 27th United Nations Climate Change Conference (COP27) was held in Sharm el-Sheikh, Egypt, bringing together representatives from more than 190 countries, regional and international organizations, and some 40,000 people from a wide range of people to discuss how to mitigate climate change and help those already affected. The Chinese delegation said that China will work with all parties to promote the success of COP27 in accordance with the principles of openness, transparency, broad participation, consensus and party-driven, and contribute wisdom and strength to building a fair, reasonable and win-win global climate governance system.
The history of human civilization can be said to be a history of the relationship between man and nature. During the primitive civilization period, human beings lived by simple gathering and fishing, and completely depended on nature to obtain living conditions; During the period of agricultural civilization, human beings began to use nature, relying on farming, animal husbandry and other methods to obtain relatively stable means of production and living to support their own development; During the period of industrial civilization, human beings relied on the power of science and technology to develop and transform nature on a large scale, and once tried to be above nature, while grabbing a large amount of material wealth, it also brought a series of ecological and environmental problems. It can be seen from history that compared with nature, human strength has gradually changed from weak to strong, and the relationship between man and nature has shown a state of balance and imbalance dynamic change.
【Experience Sharing】
Bayannur, Inner Mongolia transforms vast desert into "green treasure"
Desertification, known as the "cancer of the earth", desertification control is a worldwide problem facing mankind. In recent years, Bayannur City, Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region, in promoting the comprehensive treatment of Ulan Bu and the desert, has combined ecological governance, industrial revitalization and improvement of people's livelihood, prevented and controlled sand through artificial afforestation and grass planting, engineering sand fixation, etc., established a national-level desertification land closure reserve and a national desert park, and developed characteristic sand industries such as photovoltaic sand control, desert grape planting, organic pasture planting, organic dairy breeding, desert tourism, etc., effectively curbing the eastward invasion of the desert, cutting off the desert's sand transport channel, and realizing the "sand into and people retreating" toThe transformation of "green into sand retreat" and then to "harmony between people and sand", the vast sea of sand that was once full of yellow sand and deserted was replaced by a lush and vibrant oasis.
With the advancement of human modernization, the deep-seated contradictions between man and nature have become more and more prominent, and even more intense. Engels pointed out that human beings can dominate the natural world by changing nature to make it serve their own purposes, but we must remember at every step that human beings rule the natural world by no means standing outside the natural world. Judging from the path taken by the major developed countries in the West, they enjoy the good life brought by modernization, but they transfer the environmental consequences brought by modernization to other countries, making the overall ecological environment of the earth gradually deteriorate. In 2022, the world has encountered extreme climate change, with record-breaking high temperatures in Europe, Asia, the Americas and other places, and some places even reaching high temperatures above 50°C. Some experts have analyzed that this is closely related to the increase in greenhouse gas emissions and global warming in recent years. From the perspective of the future development trend of mankind, if the world's more than 8 billion people want to enter modernization, if they are all according to the Western modernization model, it will greatly exceed the carrying capacity of the earth's ecological environment. Therefore, we must jump out of the old path of Western modernization and find a new way for mankind as a whole to modernize. Only in this way can harmonious coexistence between man and nature be achieved on a global scale.
Chinese-style modernization focuses on solving the ecological and environmental problems in the process of China's modernization, and at the same time contributes to the solution of the tension between man and nature brought about by industrial civilization. In the process of promoting modernization, China has integrated the construction of ecological civilization into the whole process of economic, political, cultural and social construction, vigorously promoted green, low-carbon and circular development, minimized resource consumption and environmental damage, and controlled ecological and environmental problems within its own scope and did not transfer them to other countries. In 2020, China took the initiative to put forward the goal of carbon dioxide peaking and carbon neutrality, that is, carbon dioxide emissions should peak before 2030 and strive to achieve carbon neutrality before 2060. Over the past three years, China has formulated a series of policies to achieve the "dual carbon" goal and gradually implemented them, fully demonstrating the responsibility of a major country to promote global sustainable development.
【Experience Sharing】
Yunnan Dali protects the "mother lake" of Erhai like eyes
Erhai is a representative of plateau lakes and the "mother lake" of the Dali people. In the 90s of the 20th century, Erhai was polluted, and there were several outbreaks of lake-wide cyanobacteria, and the water quality dropped sharply. Over the years, Dali Bai Autonomous Prefecture in Yunnan Province has launched a comprehensive battle for the protection and governance of the Erhai Sea, and through unremitting efforts, the quality of the Erhai Sea has been effectively restored. By the end of 2022, the quality of Erhai Sea has reached excellent for three consecutive years. Now, wetlands, forests and traditional villages are scattered like gems along the 129-kilometer ecological corridor around the lake, and Erhai has become a popular "check-in place" for ecotourism and a "windy place" in the minds of netizens.
The earth is the common home of all mankind, and it is the common responsibility of all countries in the world to achieve harmonious coexistence between man and nature in the world. No country is immune to this matter. Only by adhering to the concept of a community of life on earth, jointly healing the scars of the ecological environment, and jointly building a solid foundation for ecological civilization, can future generations not only enjoy the fruitful fruits of modernization, but also wander in the green mountains and rivers.
Green water and green mountains are gold and silver mountains
Properly handling the relationship between economic development and ecological environmental protection is a worldwide problem and an eternal issue facing the development of human society. The traditional path of industrialization often focuses on development first, and only after serious environmental problems have arisen, measures are taken to repair it. Most developed Western countries have gone through such a journey, with the result of unsustainable development and heavy environmental costs. At present, the Chinese-style modernization we are promoting organically unifies economic development and ecological environmental protection, adheres to protection in development and development in protection, strives to achieve benign interaction between development and protection, and supports high-quality development with a high-quality ecological environment.
习近平总书记鲜明提出了“Green water and green mountains are gold and silver mountains”的重大理念，用生动形象的说法破解了经济发展和生态环境保护的二元悖论，深刻揭示了经济发展和生态环境保护协同共生的内在规律。土地、矿产、河流、森林等，作为人类经济活动最基本的生产资料，是社会生产力的重要组成部分。保护生态环境就是保护生产力，就是保护经济发展的基础和条件；改善生态环境就是发展生产力，就是增强经济发展的潜力和后劲。所以说，良好生态本身蕴含着无穷的经济价值，能够源源不断创造综合效益，实现经济社会可持续发展。
【Experience Sharing】
Jilin Baishan "ice and snow" transformed into "gold mountain and silver mountain"
吉林省白山市地处长白山腹地，冰雪资源得天独厚，素有“长白林海”“雪域王国”“立体资源宝库”的美称。近年来，白山市深入践行“Green water and green mountains are gold and silver mountains”“冰天雪地也是金山银山”理念，倾力打造吉林省东部避暑冰雪生态旅游大环线重点节点城市，加快冰雪旅游、冰雪运动、冰雪文化、冰雪装备等新业态发展，努力实现冰天雪地的经济价值、社会价值、文化价值，以资源兴产业，让白雪变白银。
在“Green water and green mountains are gold and silver mountains”这一理念的指引下，新时代生态文明建设取得了举世瞩目的巨大成就。面对环境污染严重、生态系统退化等“国土之殇、民生之痛”，我们从解决突出生态环境问题入手，注重点面结合、标本兼治，坚持转变观念、压实责任，承担大国责任、展现大国担当，不断深化对生态文明建设规律的认识，实现了由重点整治到系统治理、由被动应对到主动作为、由全球环境治理参与者到引领者、由实践探索到科学理论指导的重大转变。经过顽强努力，我国天更蓝、地更绿、水更清，万里河山更加多姿多彩。比如，全国地表水优良水体比例达到87.9%，地级及以上城市黑臭水体基本消除；PM2.5平均浓度历史性下降到29微克每立方米，重点城市平均浓度累计下降57%，成为全球大气质量改善速度最快的国家；累计完成防沙治沙2.78亿亩、种草改良6亿亩，实现由“沙进人退”到“绿进沙退”的历史性转变，在世界上率先实现荒漠化土地和沙化土地面积“双缩减”。生态环境的深刻变化，成为新时代党和国家事业取得历史性成就、发生历史性变革的显著标志。
If people do not live up to the green mountain, the green mountain will not live up to the people. Nature is generous and selfless, always giving everything it has to nourish all things, never thinking about gains and losses. We have protected the green water and green mountains, and nature will definitely give us the most precious wealth, and the "evergreen tree" will become the "cash cow", allowing us to harvest the gold and silver mountains. The greening and ecology of development represents the direction of scientific and technological development and industrial transformation, and is the field with the most market prospects and development potential, which can create advantages and brands with strong attractiveness. From the trend of modern economic and social development, the quality of the ecological environment has increasingly become an important dimension to measure the comprehensive competitiveness of a region and a city. As the saying goes, "Fish live after water and grass, birds choose good trees to live." "If all else is met, people are more willing to invest, develop, work and travel in places with green waters and mountains." Some places in China, due to the limitations of objective conditions, did not develop in the past, but the ecological environment has been protected, and now it has become a "fragrant glutton", a hot spot for investment in the green economy, and a "check-in place" for people's leisure tourism.
The ecological environment is not only related to the quality of economic development, but also to the quality of life of everyone. For human survival, gold and silver mountains are of course important, but green waters and green mountains are more basic and key, and are an important source and concentrated embodiment of people's happiness. How much the GDP of a place grows, the people may not feel so obvious, but the ecological environment has deteriorated, the water is polluted, there are fewer trees, and there are more smog days, and the people will feel it intuitively. If people live in a harsh ecological environment all day long, no matter how much money they earn and how good their material conditions are, there is no happiness at all. In this sense, protecting the ecological environment is to protect people's livelihood, that is, to provide people with the most inclusive and valuable people's livelihood well-being.
Building a beautiful China
Chinese's yearning for a better environment is engraved in the national genes, and many ancients have pinned their love on the mountains and rivers, leaving countless famous beautiful texts. It can be said that this land where we were born is not only an eternal living space, but also an eternal spiritual home. In the process of promoting the construction of a strong country and national rejuvenation, we will create a development miracle of modernization on a land area of more than 9.6 million square kilometers, and will also leave a picturesque and beautiful China to future generations.
【Experience Sharing】
Yancheng, Jiangsu promotes green and low-carbon development
Yancheng, Jiangsu Province has a superior natural ecology, large-scale green industry, and potential carbon sink space, and has been continuously promoting clean, low-carbon, safe and efficient use of energy, gradually building a new energy industry chain ecosystem, and promoting a comprehensive green transformation of economic and social development. At present, Yancheng has become the first batch of new energy demonstration cities in China, the pilot of regional agglomeration development of the national offshore wind power industry, the first "10 million kilowatt new energy power generation city" in the Yangtze River Delta region, and is known as the "first city of offshore wind power".
今后5年是美丽中国建设的重要时期，我国经济社会发展已经进入加快绿色化、低碳化的高质量发展阶段，生态文明建设仍然处于压力叠加、负重前行的关键期。我们必须以更高站位、更宽视野、更大力度来谋划和推进生态环境保护工作。党的二十大在深入总结新时代生态文明建设成就经验的基础上，对中国式现代化在生态文明建设领域的目标任务进行了部署，对今后一个时期推动绿色发展、促进Man and nature live in harmony提出了新的要求。这生动擘画了中国式现代化的绿色图景，吹响了新征程上推进美丽中国建设的嘹亮号角。
Take the road of green development. Green is the bright background color of China's modernization, and green and low-carbon development is the solution to ecological and environmental problems. In the final analysis, ecological and environmental problems are issues of development mode and lifestyle, and the promotion of green development should also be carried out around these two aspects. In terms of development mode, efforts will be made to build a green and low-carbon circular economy system, accelerate the formation of an industrial structure with high scientific and technological content, low resource consumption and less environmental pollution, and greatly improve the degree of economic greening; In terms of lifestyle, we will actively carry out national green actions, vigorously advocate green consumption, stimulate the endogenous motivation of the whole society to jointly care for the ecological environment, and make green and low-carbon lifestyles become customs.
【Experience Sharing】
Shanghai garbage sorting from "new fashion" to "good habit"
On May 21, 2023, General Secretary Xi Jinping replied to the volunteers of garbage sorting on the streets of Jiaxing Road, Hongkou District, Shanghai, encouraging them to do a good job in publicity and guidance with heart and heart, and drive more residents to develop the good habit of sorting and delivery. Shanghai is one of the first cities in the country to comprehensively carry out garbage sorting. In recent years, from "throwing into one basket" to "subdividing four barrels", from "prescribed work" to "conscious action", from "new fashion" to "good habits", garbage classification has become the epitome of Shanghai's "embroidery effort" to promote grassroots governance, providing a vivid footnote for megacities to practice Xi Jinping's ecological civilization thought.
Fight the battle of defending the blue sky and clear water. Through continuous efforts, the battle against pollution has achieved great results, compared to the past, our environment has become better, the sky is bluer, the water is clearer, the mountains are greener, and people's happiness from the environment is getting stronger and stronger. However, we must be soberly aware that at present, China's total pollutant emissions are still at a high level, the historical arrears of environmental protection have not been paid off, and the people's new expectations for the improvement of the ecological environment are getting higher and higher. We must maintain strategic concentration, persevere and make contributions for a long time, adhere to precise pollution control, scientific pollution control, and management of pollution according to law, maintain intensity, extend depth, and expand breadth, continue to carry out air pollution prevention and control, water pollution prevention and soil pollution prevention and control, concentrate on overcoming prominent ecological and environmental problems around the people, continue to improve the quality of the ecological environment, and never accept troops unless we win a complete victory.
Strengthen ecological governance with a systematic concept. Landscapes, forests, lakes, grass and sand are a community of life, and their lifelines are interdependent, closely linked, and unified in the ecological system. For a large country with a vast territory, various ecological patterns are available, and they are scattered within the national space, and the characteristics of ecosystem diversity are more obvious. To strengthen China's ecological governance, we must carry out overall protection, system restoration and comprehensive management in accordance with the integrity, systematization and inherent laws of the ecosystem, and comprehensively consider all elements of the natural ecology, mountains and mountains, above and below ground, shore water, urban and rural areas, land and sea, and the upstream and downstream of river basins, and improve the diversity, stability and sustainability of ecosystems.
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The national carbon emission trading market releases new momentum for emission reduction
The construction of a unified national carbon emission trading market is an important institutional innovation that uses market mechanisms to control and reduce greenhouse gas emissions and promote the green and low-carbon transformation of economic development mode, and is also a core policy tool for implementing China's carbon peak and carbon neutrality. As of August 14, 2023, the national carbon market has operated for 503 trading days, with a cumulative trading volume of 243 million tons of carbon emission allowances and a cumulative turnover of 11.192 billion yuan.
Actively and steadily promote carbon peaking and carbon neutrality. The realization of the "dual carbon" goal is proposed by China based on the development characteristics of the next few decades, reflecting the unity of reality and possibility, phased and long-term, and needs to be based on national conditions and move forward step by step. In some places, when implementing relevant policies, there is a phenomenon of "deviation". Some engage in "carbon charge", some engage in "one-size-fits-all", sports "carbon reduction", and even "power cuts", which affects people's normal production and life order. Achieving carbon peak and carbon neutrality is a broad and profound economic and social system change, we must base on China's energy resource endowment, adhere to the first establishment and then break, deeply promote the energy revolution, gradually shift to the "dual control" system of total carbon emission and carbon emission intensity, and push this arduous task forward in a planned and step-by-step manner.
Marx said, "Society is the complete essential unity of man and nature, the true resurrection of nature." In his view, only in a communist society can true reconciliation between man and nature be achieved. Chinese-style modernization surpasses the Western view of nature, opens up a new path of modernization for the construction of ecological civilization, and provides valuable wisdom and new solutions for mankind to finally solve the contradiction with the natural world and lead to the ideal society of the future.
【In-depth reading】
1.习近平：《努力建设Man and nature live in harmony的现代化》，《求是》2022年第11期。
2.《习近平在全国生态环境保护大会上强调全面推进美丽中国建设加快推进Man and nature live in harmony的现代化》，《人民日报》2023年7月19日。
