China has set a target of reducing its annual coal capacity by 800 million tons, according to a government plan reported Saturday by state media.
Despite the target, Beijing expects total coal output to rise to around 3.9 billion tons by 2020, compared to 3.75 billion tons in 2015, the official Xinhua news agency said, citing a document issued by the country’s top economic planning body.
The plan aims to “improve coal production safety and efficiency, as well as reducing impact on the environment,” Xinhua said, suggesting that low-capacity mines were likely to be the target of closures.
The reduction in outdated capacity reflects the slowdown in demand in China. By 2020, the world’s second largest economy will burn around 4.1 billion tons compared to 3.96 billion tons last year — a very moderate growth rate.
Overall, China’s energy consumption is now growing at only 3 percent per year, compared to 10 percent a few years ago, after a sharp slowdown in economic growth.
Coal, of which China is the world’s largest consumer, remains an indispensable part of its economy, supplying 60 percent of its electricity.
The country also intends to modernize its coal-fired power plants by 2020 to reduce emissions of “major pollutants” by 60 percent and is committed to stabilizing its CO2 emissions “around 2030.”
Ivory trade
China will ban all ivory trade and processing by the end of 2017, the government said, in a move hailed by conservationists as a “game changer” for African elephants.
African ivory is highly sought after in China, where it is seen as a status symbol, with prices for a kilo (2.2 pounds) reaching as high as $1,100.
“To better protect elephants and better tackle the illegal trade... China will gradually stop the processing and sale of ivory for commercial purposes” by the end of 2017, the State Council, China’s Cabinet, said in a statement late Friday.
“Before then, law enforcement agencies will continue to clamp down on illegality associated with elephant tusks,” the official Xinhua news agency said, quoting a government official as saying.
A first batch of workshops and retailers would be forced to close by the end of March.
The move comes after Beijing said in March it would widen a ban on imports of all ivory and ivory products acquired before 1975, after pressure to restrict a trade that sees thousands of elephants slaughtered every year.
Xinhua said the complete ban would affect “34 processing enterprises and 143 designated trading venues, with dozens to be closed by the end of March 2017.”
“This is great news that will shut down the world’s largest market for elephant ivory,” Aili Kang, executive director of the Wildlife Conservation Society in Asia, said in a statement.
Between 800 and 900 cases of ivory smuggling are uncovered in China each year, according to customs figures. And more than half of legitimate ivory businesses are implicated in the illegal trade.
The US — the world’s second-largest consumer of illegal ivory after China — announced in June a near-total ban on the trade of African elephant ivory but with notable exemptions including antiques.

Source: Arab News