UN agency releases Chinese version of GEO-5

The United Nations Environment Programme launched its Chinese version of the Global Environment Outlook-5 (GEO-5) on Tuesday in China's Kubuqi desert, as the agency hopes to bring suggestions and guidelines to Chinese policy makers on environment protection.

The GEO-5 reports on the state, trends and outlook of the environment, and aims to facilitate the interaction between science and policy.

The fifth edition unveils both progress and regression towards international sustainability targets in terms of atmosphere, land, water, biodiversity, marine pollution, chemicals and waste.

Amina Mohamed, deputy executive director of the UNEP, hopes the GEO-5 report can help China make itself a green economy.

Tu Ruihe, an officer from Chinese Ministry of Environment Protection, praised the document. "The assessments of GEO-5 provide significant guidance to China's work on environment protection", Tu said.

Sha Zukang, the secretary-general of the Rio+20 conference in June, said that the guidelines of the GEO-5 need to be transformed into practical results.

Kubuqi is the seventh-largest desert in China and home to over 130,000 people in Hangjin county in Edors. It lies to the south of the Yellow River about 400 km east to west.

Experts who write the GEO reports also showed interest in studying the Kubuqi case.

"Maybe we can share the experience of Kubuqi anti-desertification pattern in the GEO-6 report in the future," said Huang Yi, an expert on environmental studies with Peking University, who participated in the creation of the GEO-5 report.