(ECNS) -- The Ministry of Environmental Protection (MEP) will restart research into "green GDP 2.0", a second generation method for calculating an environmentally friendly gross domestic product (GDP), by running pilot schemes in different regions across China.
Li Qingrui, head of the MEP's policy and law department, said that green GDP 2.0 supplements the current national economic accounting system, rather than being opposed to it.
Green GDP 2.0 comprises calculations of environmental costs and benefits, environmental capacity, as well as gross ecosystem development.
The research program has two distinct phases: developing a calculating system for green GDP 2.0 during 2014-2015, and running pilots during 2016-2017.
Publication of the tryout results of green GDP 2.0 is dependent on the research process.
China's former State Environmental Protection Administration and National Bureau of Statistics initiated research on the first generation of green GDP calculation in 2004.
In 2005, green GDP 1.0 was piloted in ten provinces and municipalities including Beijing, Tianjin, Hebei and Liaoning.
A research report on China's green GDP in 2004 was published in September 2006, the first of its kind for the nation.
Green GDP is an index of economic growth with the environmental consequences of that growth taken into account.
Calculating green GDP requires that net natural capital consumption, including resource depletion, environmental degradation, as well as protective and restorative environmental initiatives, be subtracted from the traditional GDP measure.
