Statistics show that exports by China-based foreign manufacturers last year were at $6,722 billion, 56 percent of the country's total and 0.7 percentage points higher than the previous year.

China's ongoing industrialization has been achieved to a large extent by excessive consumption of limited natural resources and environmental degeneration.

According to the International Energy Agency, the country consumed 0.82 ton of standard oil for every $1,000 increase in GDP value in 2007, in contrast to the world average of 0.30 ton of standard oil for the same metric. In the US and Japan, the figure was 0.20 ton and 0.10 ton respectively.

The extensive economic growth and industrialization have pushed China's fast-growing economy to the verge of resource exhaustion and environmental degradation.

Whether or not China can transform its high-energy and high-pollutant industrialization to a resources-conservative and environment-friendly model is the key to whether it can succeed in pushing forward the process.

The dazzling opening ceremony of the Shanghai Expo, as well as the grand and expensively decorated China pavilion, have not changed the basic fact that many of the country's inland regions are still economically underdeveloped.

A harmonious, sustainable ecological environment has increasingly become an important metric of a country's development level.

It is in this regard that China has to travel a long distance before catching up with developed nations.

The author is a researcher at the Institute of Japanese Studies under the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences.

(China Daily 05/06/2010 page8)