The workshop was the third in a series, aiming at developing indicators for sustainable development to support decision making in China. The project is financed by the Royal Norwegian Embassy in Beijing. The idea of the project is to develop applicable indicators to supplement the economic indicators regularly used to measure a nation’s development. This will be important for China, which is facing tremendous social challenges related to rapid development and environmental challenges from industrial production, energy production and transport. All of these must be addressed to ensure China´s sustainable development according to the 12th five years plan of the Chinese government. In his welcome speech, Executive Vice President of CASTED Mr. Wang Yuan underlined the importance of the ongoing project for Chinese future national governance for a sustainable development.
The project builds on the valuable, international experience of CASTED, Statistics Norway, FAFO and BI Norwegian Business School. This workshop will establish the framework for a pilot on sustainable indicators and the pilot will be carried out in the main phase of the project. Emerging nations such as the BRICS countries are facing similar challenges. In the future, this project aims at introducing the new set of indicators to India and Brazil in addition to China initially. Hopefully, this will give these countries a more solid base for the governance of their own development as well as strengthen their position in the global context. The workshop was characterized by enthusiasm and systematic work to address this complex field with open, creative and relevant discussions.
CASTED is an important think tank in China, advising the Ministry of Science and Technology directly on policy development. The cooperation between CASTED and FAFO has be going on for many years and has come to play an important role in building long term relations between China and Norway in the field of developing advanced models for governance.
Counsellor for Development Ms. Gunnvor Berge and Counsellor for Science and Higher Education Ms. Kari Kveseth from the Royal Norwegian Embassy in Beijing attended the workshop.