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Environmentally friendly (also eco-friendly, nature friendly, and

green) are synonyms used to refer to goods and services, laws,
guidelines and policies considered to inflict minimal or no harm on
the environment.[1] To make consumers aware, environmentally
friendly goods and services often are marked with eco-labels. But
because there is no single international standard for this concept,
the International Organization for Standardization considers such
labels too vague to be meaningful.

Everybody these days is going on about running things in a more
environmentally friendly way. Everything has been affected in
some way by the recent push from the government to make
everything as environmentally "green" as possible, but what exactly
are the advantages of doing things in an environmentally friendly
way, especially for businesses?

What are we really doing to stop big businesses from forwarding
the effects of global warming? This is a question that can win or
lose you an election. And there isnt much that government was
doing up until some time ago when they realized that the people
cared.

So just how does the government make sure the big companies are
being eco friendly?
The first thing they do is enact laws that make it difficult to pollute
the earth. You might be asking how can they do that? Well there are
companies that the government has that make it there job to go around
and test power plants and factories and see how many fossil fuels they
are burning and how much pollutants they are releasing into the
earths atmosphere. If they are in violation there can be severe
penalties. They also make sure this information is available to the
public because once the public sees how gross they are being to the
environment it could cause for boycotts and a loss of profits and thats
the very last thing a business wants to see.

Companies who decide to go green on the other hand get a great
opportunity to save their business money. The government decides to
give tax breaks to companies who make good choices about how they
conserve energy. They allow them to convert to alternative sources of
power and will give them money towards the installation. This is the
best possible solution to getting the government to embrace them. The
government will reward them for being so eco friendly.

Even if you dont believe that global warming is a problem the
fact is that people are in a mass mobilization to stop the effects
of global warming by encouraging citizens to go green in their
homes and in their small businesses. This can be outfitting
places with eco friendly light bulbs or other equipment or it can
more complicated like putting solar panels on the roof in order
to generate the power needed without having to use our fossil
fuels like gas, coal, and petroleum. These changes are being
seen throughout the world but what is the government doing
about the really big businesses? What are the really big
businesses doing to be policed?

So what is the government doing to protect the earth against this eco
unfriendly people?

The fact is the government hasnt always been a proponent of a
cleaner planet. There has been things like earth day but beyond
that there hasnt always been that much involvement until
recently. The reason being: you. You determine the election of
these people to office and that is making all the difference.
Somewhere along the line someone found out that people were
beginning to care about the earth and what these companies
were doing to it and they wanted the people who were in the
public office to care just as much as they do but that wasnt
happening. But as the mobilization of a cleaner planet got
underway they realized beyond the shadow of a doubt that if
they wanted to stay in office there were going to have to care
more than they used to so they began gearing their campaigns
around a cleaner planet and enforcing a more environmentally
friendly business model. As politicians quickly learned its not
enough to say you cared, you had to show it too.

The attention given to environmental protection is not only coming
from the bottom up. Just a week earlier, national television
highlighted President Hu Jintao, Premier Wen Jiabao, and six other
top Chinese leaders as they visited the Energy Saving Emissions
Reduction and New Energy Science and Technology Expo in
Beijing.
Their action sent a strong signal that the Chinese central
government recognizes the importance of environmental
protection and clean energy. With support for environmental
protection coming from the top, it is more likely that not only
the central government system but also local governments will
gradually embrace President Hus scientific concept of
development, an effort to balance economic growth with
natural environment protection.

Last month, at the 2009 National Peoples Congress, Premier Wen
Jiabao announced Chinas progress in promoting energy efficiency
and emissions reduction. Compared to 2007, energy consumption per
unit of GDP fell by 4.59 percent in 2008, while sulfur dioxide (SO2)
emissions and chemical oxygen demand (COD) fell by 5.95 percent
and 4.42 percent, respectively. These figures show lower energy
consumption and lower emissions than the previous two years when
China started to implement the 11th Five-Year Plan, which set targets
to reduce energy consumption per unit of GDP by 20 percent by 2010,
and reduce SO2 emissions and COD levels by 10% by 2010,
compared to 2005.

While these examples point to progress in Chinas
environmental management and sustainable development efforts
at both the grassroots and highest government levels, some
wonder if these achievements are instead just side effects of the
financial crisis and accompanying slowdown in economic
activity. The global financial crisis has resulted in the closure of
many factories, especially export-oriented ones, and therefore
emissions from these have indeed been reduced. Since the
economic recovery is likely to take some time, near-term
environmental pollution is likely to be reduced during this
period of lower production.
However, the economic crisis could shift priorities from
environmental protection to stimulating the economy. This
worries some because it could mean the prospects for future
energy conservation and energy protection are not promising.

Adding to these concerns, at the National Peoples Congress session
in March, the central government also announced that investment in
sustainable development was cut by 40 percent in Chinas 4 trillion
RMB yuan (about $586 billion dollars) economic stimulus plan.
Compared to the original plan, which came out in November 2008,
investment in sustainable development was scaled down from 350
billion RMB yuan, or 8.7 percent of the overall plan, to 210 billion
RMB yuan, representing just 5.2 percent of the plan.

Projects that fall under sustainable development include:
wastewater treatment facilities, solid waste disposal facilities,
pollution prevention and treatment in key rivers, reforestation,
and energy efficiency engineering. Environmentalists hope that
other areas of the stimulus plan, such as public infrastructure
and technology advancement, might reflect environmental
protection needs, but as of last month, 104 billion RMB yuan
worth of projects under the stimulus plan failed to pass
environmental impact assessments and were put on hold. This
includes projects that were too energy intensive, might threaten
drinking water sources, or damage nature reserves. (Projects
totaling 970 billion RMB yuan did pass environmental impact
assessments.).

While this demonstrates that environmental impact assessments
required by the Ministry of Environment are being
performed and heeded to, it also reflects that there remains a
considerable lack of attention to environmental protection
during project design. On the enterprise side, the financial crisis
has made it harder for businesses to get loans and make
investments in environmental measures. If enterprises have to
balance meeting the demands of economic survival, paying
workers the minimum wage, and also protecting the
environment, it is likely that environmental protection measures
will be the first to go. In addition, with the governments strong
commitment to economic recovery, local governments are likely
to loosen the enforcement of environmental protection
regulations.


Source: The Economic Observer Online, March 7, 2009

In spite of this, there are still some promising signs of the longer term
prospects for China to achieve environmental sustainability.
The Asia Foundations China program recently launched an
environmental entrepreneurship training project. It is exciting to see
emerging entrepreneurs so enthusiastic about finding business
solutions to the environmental problems and including environmental
protection in their business plans.

Chinas environmental challenges cannot be solved without policy
changes that encourage environmentally friendly enterprises and
discourage polluting ones. However, more entrepreneurs and
employees in environmentally friendly businesses could gradually
encourage progressive environmental practices and policies. And that
could leave a lasting impact for Chinas environment, one that the
country could be as proud of as it was of the Olympics.

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The government should strengthen existing environmental
regulations with a focus on measures such as the eco-labeling of
products
and waste separation, recycling and reduction.
This includes recognising that there will
be additional costs of production in fulfilling certain environmental
regulations, with implications.
government should enhance
education on corporate social responsibility (CSR) and environmental
conservation for businesses (eg, through seminars), and provide more
inspiration and support for the implementation of relevant policies
and
programmes.
In increasing the awareness of businesses that
business development and profits can go along with environmental
conservation, and better environmental management practices can
give them
long-term benefits or even new business opportunities, the
government
should keep them informed of the successful strategies implemented
by
international corporations, as well as of positive cases of cooperation.
In addition, there are other possible roles that can be played by the
government in facilitating and improving
corporate environmental management
First, the government could create a forum for businesses to meet and
share their views for example, by organising seminars on
corporate environmental management, and by setting-up an online
system
which indirectly links them up. Second, the government should act as
a
role model and use environmentally friendly products. Third,
advocacy
and education through the mass media (eg, TV programmes) could
help
put public pressure on businesses. Fourth, the government could
require
corporations to publish mandatory CSR reports to increase the
transparency
of their environmental performance. This could increase their
awareness of environmental issue. Fifth, the government could collect
ideas from schools
and universities in planning relevant policies. The government needs
to
take more long-term actions to facilitate the cooperation of businesses
instead of just staying at the current levels of promotion and
feasibility studies.
Many companies are eager to jump on the "green" bandwagon hoping
to be able to charge more for environmentally friendly products or
gain a marketing advantage. There is certainly nothing wrong with
private companies providing environmentally friendly products to
consumers. It is another matter when the government dictates their
use through law, regulations, taxes and subsidies.