Gov’t holds key to sustaining green growth

Han Seung-soo, chairman of Global Green Growth Institute (GGGI)

Green growth is a new growth paradigm that requires the government’s initiative to sustain, former Prime Minister Han Seung-soo said Tuesday.

During an interview at his office in downtown Seoul, the chairman of the Global Green Growth Institute (GGGI) which is headquartered there, Han said, “The government has to be a leader while the private sector is a follower. Once the government sets the strategy in motion, then there will be incentives for the private sector to join in.”

Han, who was president of the United Nations General Assembly between 2001 and 2002 when his chief of staff was Ban Ki-moon, now secretary general of the world body, went on to say, “Green growth is a revolutionary paradigm shift and a revolution does not take place in the market. The government needs to take the initiative to lead the green revolution.

“Green growth cannot be achieved if the national and global economy is left to the free market. So the government needs to play a role in providing economic incentives and disincentives, subsidies, regulations and other macroeconomic planning tools, especially in developing countries.”

On Korea’s position on green growth, Han explained that Korea is the first country that implemented a green growth strategy. Green growth is Korea’s response to the challenge of climate change.

“Most countries are trying to respond to climate change, but unless you change the system, you will not be able to solve the fundamental problems. Climate change is one of the best examples of externality on a global scale and what we are trying to do in Korea is to internalize it by endorsing climate change as a domestic variable in our policy planning equation,” Han elaborated.

Han’s activities in green growth are no surprise. Until the mid-1980s, he was an academic teaching economics at Cambridge and Seoul National University (and wrote columns for The Korea Times in the 1980s).

Then he turned to politics, becoming a member of the National Assembly for 12 years before being appointed finance minister, a diplomat (he was minister of foreign affairs and ambassador to Washington), and a top global bureaucrat at the U.N. before serving as prime minister between 2008 and 2009.

“Three years ago when I was prime minister and served as chairman of the 2009 OECD Ministerial Council Meeting, I was able to garner the unanimous support of participating ministers to adopt the Declaration on Green Growth. Based on that resolution, the OECD Secretariat began to study green growth, producing this year a very important document titled Towards Green Growth.”

As for the GGGI, there is an ongoing process to turn the Seoul-headquartered entity into an international organization and the Establishment Agreement of GGGI was adopted at the Global Green Growth Summit in Seoul in May, 2012.

“Green growth is not a luxury which can only be afforded in developed countries but a necessity for any country which wants to grow and at the same time, to enhance environmental sustainability,” Han said. <Korea Times/Nho Joon-hun>

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