Focus on promoting innovative development of green trade
In recent years, under the guidance of the "dual carbon" target, China's green trade has accelerated its development, becoming a typical feature of foreign trade transformation and upgrading. The 2026 Government Work Report and the 15th Five Year Plan outline both make strategic arrangements for the development of green trade. Currently, in the context of the comprehensive green transformation of China's economic and social development, the traditional trade model characterized by high resource consumption and high environmental costs is no longer suitable for the new requirements of high-quality development. During the 15th Five Year Plan period, we must adhere to the principle of harmonious coexistence between humans and nature, deeply integrate the concept of ecological priority and green development into the entire trade chain and all links, promote the transformation of trade dynamics from "quantity driven" to "quality led" and "innovation empowered", and achieve innovative development of green trade. This is not only an internal requirement for promoting Chinese path to modernization, but also a practical action for China to fulfill its responsibility as a major country, deeply participate in global governance, and promote the construction of a community with a shared future for mankind.
1. Deeply understand the significance of developing green trade in the era
General Secretary Xi Jinping emphasized that "green development is an inevitable requirement for ecological civilization construction, representing the direction of current technological and industrial transformation, and is the most promising development field." Developing green trade is not only related to the background and quality of China's high-quality economic development, but also a strategic choice related to global ecological security and sustainable human development.
Firstly, this is an inherent requirement for achieving modernization that promotes harmonious coexistence between humans and nature. Chinese path to modernization takes the harmonious coexistence of man and nature as its essential requirement, which means that all economic activities, including international trade, must follow the concept of green development. International trade connects domestic and international markets, allocates global resources, and its mode and structure directly affect the ecological environment. Traditional trade models often externalize environmental costs, leading to excessive resource consumption and pollution transfer, exacerbating global ecological imbalances. Therefore, it is necessary to promote the green transformation of trade: establish a green accounting system to accurately quantify environmental costs, force industrial upgrading through green standards, drive technological innovation through green consumption, and internalize environmental costs into the trade system. As a result, the trade structure will evolve towards low-carbon, circular, and efficient, which will help fully leverage the market power of resource intensive utilization and promote the diffusion of environmental protection technologies, laying a solid foundation for the modernization of harmonious coexistence between humans and nature.
Secondly, this is an inevitable choice to fulfill the responsibility of a major country in addressing climate change. Climate change, as a global public crisis that concerns the future and destiny of humanity, cannot be ignored by any country. International trade and cross-border transportation are important sources of greenhouse gas emissions, and their green transformation has become a key link in global climate governance. As the world's largest trading nation in goods, China shoulders important responsibilities in global climate governance. Fulfilling this responsibility means that the "dual carbon" target must be systematically and deeply integrated into the trade policy system: on the one hand, it is necessary to significantly increase the trade scale of low-carbon products and technology services such as photovoltaics, wind power, and electric vehicles, and help other countries accelerate energy transformation and low-carbon development; On the other hand, efforts should be made to accelerate the decarbonization process of ocean shipping, air cargo and cross-border logistics systems, actively promote the dialogue between the "the Belt and Road" green trade and international rules, effectively avoid the impact of "carbon leakage" and unilateral carbon barriers on the multilateral trading system, show a constructive leading role in global climate governance, and truly reflect the mission of "a community with a shared future for mankind".
Thirdly, this is a strategic choice to cultivate new international competitive advantages for the future. The global green rule system is rapidly being restructured, with new rules emerging such as the Carbon Border Adjustment Mechanism (CBAM), battery passports, and supply chain due diligence legislation. Green standards are increasingly becoming the threshold for international market access. In this context, developing green trade, driving domestic industrial technological innovation through green market access, and promoting the industrialization and globalization of green technology innovation can not only cultivate a group of green industry clusters that have already taken the lead in fields such as photovoltaics, energy storage, and ultra-high voltage, but also stimulate emerging trade forms such as smart energy management and carbon asset management services through the integration of digital technology and green technology. Promote China to upgrade from a "supplier" of global green products to a "setter" of green technology standards, establish sustainable competitive advantages in the new track of high-end, intelligent and green development, and achieve a historic leap from trade scale advantage to trade quality advantage.
2. Firmly grasp the key areas of innovative development in green trade
Promoting green transformation in trade is a systematic project that should focus on achieving substantial progress in the following three interrelated and progressive key areas, realizing breakthroughs from point to area and depth, and building the "four beams and eight pillars" of green trade development.
Promote the expansion and improvement of green trade, and promote the greening of trading partners. Greening of trade partners refers to promoting the import and export of goods and services while reducing environmental footprint and enhancing ecological benefits. Specifically, in the field of goods trade, it is necessary to develop environmentally friendly products on a large scale, actively expand the export of advantageous green products such as new energy vehicles, photovoltaic modules, and energy-saving household appliances, create the "China Green Manufacturing" brand, and enhance the environmental reputation and added value of products; Encourage the introduction of advanced low-carbon technologies, key equipment, and core components to drive the upgrading of green technologies. In the field of service trade, we will focus on expanding knowledge intensive green services such as ecological consulting, carbon asset management, and green finance, cultivating new growth points, and providing supporting support for green goods trade. To this end, it is necessary to accelerate the establishment of a green standard, certification, and labeling system that covers the entire lifecycle, promote mutual recognition and connection of domestic and foreign standards, break down implicit green barriers, and promote the efficient circulation of green products and services worldwide.
Build a green supply chain management system and promote the greening of the trade process. Even if the trading partner itself is green, if its supply chain has problems such as high consumption and high emissions, it will still weaken the overall transformation effectiveness. Therefore, green management must be expanded from products to the entire industry chain. We should promote the implementation of green supply chain strategies by chain owners, by setting supplier environmental thresholds and continuous improvement requirements, to transmit green standards to upstream and downstream, and drive the overall greening of the industrial chain. The logistics sector should develop a green transportation system with multimodal transport as the backbone, apply new energy vehicles on a large scale, and promote recyclable packaging and standardized vehicles. At the same time, establish a closed-loop management system from green design to recycling and reuse, promote the standardization of trade in renewable resource products, strengthen international cooperation in circular economy, and upgrade traditional "linear trade" to an efficient resource recycling "circular trade" model.
Transforming rule participants into leaders and promoting the greening of trade rules. Rules are the "baton" and "navigator" of trade activities. If there are no green trade rules that are in line with international standards and fair and reasonable, the aforementioned efforts may be counterproductive due to rule conflicts, and even lead to trade frictions. Therefore, it is necessary to actively participate in negotiations on trade and environmental issues within the framework of the World Trade Organization, and promote the formulation of international rules that balance environmental and trade goals while taking into account the special needs of developing countries. In bilateral and regional free trade agreement negotiations, it is necessary to actively set the agenda, include high-level and actionable environmental chapters, and accumulate experience through regional practice. At the same time, based on the national conditions, we will accelerate the construction of a green trade statistics, accounting, and monitoring system that is in line with international rules and in line with China's development stage, provide Chinese solutions for international negotiations, lay a data and institutional foundation for safeguarding development rights and interests, and guide domestic enterprises to undergo green transformation.
3. Solidly promote the practical path of innovative development of green trade
Promoting innovative development of green trade cannot be achieved overnight. It requires collaboration among the government, enterprises, and society, and the comprehensive use of various tools such as technology, industry, policies, and international cooperation to steadily advance along a clear practical path.
Strengthen the drive of technological innovation. The competitiveness of green trade is rooted in the strength of green technology. Green and low-carbon cutting-edge technologies have the characteristics of strong public goods attributes, high investment risks, and long return cycles. It is necessary for the national finance to increase research and development investment in key areas such as renewable energy, energy storage, carbon capture, and green materials, and strive to form a group of core technologies with independent intellectual property rights. At the same time, we will strengthen the position of enterprises as the main body of innovation, promote the integration of green research and development into competitive strategies through policies such as tax incentives and green procurement, establish green technology centers, and carry out full process green innovation. We also need to attach importance to digital empowerment and use technologies such as big data, the Internet of Things, and blockchain to build a smart logistics and green supply chain traceability platform, achieving measurable, reportable, and verifiable carbon footprints throughout the entire chain, and improving the management efficiency of green trade through digitization.
Promote the green upgrading of industries. Trade is an extension of industry, and the high-quality development of green trade cannot be achieved without a modern industrial system that is green and low-carbon. We should fully leverage the guiding role of trade policies and encourage the export of high value-added, low environmental impact green products through optimizing tools such as export tax rebates, gradually limiting the export of high energy consuming and high emission products. At the same time, it is necessary to systematically cultivate green and low-carbon industrial clusters, build green manufacturing bases around advantageous fields such as new energy vehicles, photovoltaics, and wind power, and enhance the overall green level and international competitiveness of the industrial chain through scale and branding. In addition, we should vigorously develop the circular economy, promote the circular transformation of industrial parks, improve the utilization level of renewable resources, and lay a solid industrial foundation for related products to participate in international trade. The comprehensive green upgrading of industries is the source of vitality for achieving fundamental optimization of trade structure.
Improve the policy and institutional system. A sound legal and policy system is the foundation for guiding market forces to support the development of green trade. We should accelerate the improvement of the legal framework for promoting green trade, establish economic incentive tools such as green taxation, credit, bonds, and insurance, improve the mandatory disclosure system of corporate environmental information, and innovate specialized green financial products and services to provide long-term, stable, and low-cost market-oriented financing support for green trade. At the same time, it is necessary to strengthen regulatory coordination and information sharing among departments such as ecological environment, commerce, customs, and finance, and to strengthen the environmental responsibility of enterprises in trade activities through strict law enforcement, effectively preventing cross-border pollution transfer. In addition, a systematic service system should be established to assist enterprises in understanding and responding to new trade rules such as international green standards and carbon tariffs, continuously improving their green compliance capabilities and international competitiveness, and building a comprehensive supporting environment for the development of green trade.
Deepen global openness and cooperation. Green transformation is a global issue, and isolation has no way out. China should firmly uphold the multilateral trading system centered on the WTO and oppose all forms of green protectionism. To this end, it is necessary to solidly promote the green "the Belt and Road" construction, fully integrate green standards into infrastructure, energy cooperation and industrial investment, and share China's experience and technological achievements in the field of green development with the co construction countries. At the same time, by deepening the "South South Cooperation" project, we will help developing countries enhance their green industry capabilities and trade levels. On this basis, China should actively promote an open, inclusive, fair and just global green trade and investment environment on multilateral platforms such as the United Nations, G20, APEC, etc., and promote the construction of a new global green governance pattern of consultation, co construction and sharing among countries, so that the fruits of green trade can truly benefit all countries and peoples.