Maurice Strong, co-founder and Chairman Emeritus of the Earth Council Alliance, and Qu Geping, known as the father of China's environmental protection, made a joint announcement Thursday that the two sides will join efforts to promote the research, development and utilization of environment-friendly technologies in different industries worldwide.

Strong, who is a former under-secretary-general of the United Nations, addressed the meeting, speaking highly of China's enormous efforts in environmental protection by governments at all levels, different organizations and individuals, over the past decades.

Meanwhile, he urged China to give greater importance to the study, development and spread of environment-friendly technologies in all industries, so as to curb increasingly severe industrial pollution.

Qu, who is former minister of the State Environmental Protection Administration and former chairman of the Environmental Protection and Land Resources Committee of the National People's Congress, expressed optimism about the future of environmental protection in the country.

The government has paid great attention to the issue and China's enormous achievements in this field have drawn worldwide attention, Qu said. But serious problems still exist in the country and in some areas the problems have caused social problems, he noted.

A group of Chinese and foreign environmental experts and scholars gathered in the Mianshan Tourist Resort, in north China's Shanxi Province, to attend the annual conference of the Earth Council Alliance, which is focused on clean industrial technologies.

The Earth Council Alliance gave an award to Yan Jiying, chairman of the board of the Sanjia Coal-Chemical Company Ltd., for his "exceptional contribution to sustainable development through the innovation and utilization of clean coke technology."

Yan, the first Chinese entrepreneur to receive the award, invented a clean coke technology that minimizes coking plant pollution.

At the meeting, Strong and Qu made a joint proposal, calling for spreading Yan's invention to China and other coke producing countries in an effort to curb rampant coking industry pollution.

Strong established the Earth Council in 1992. In 2004, he and Tommy Short co-founded the Earth Council Alliance to coordinate the cooperation of earth councils in different countries.

(Xinhua News Agency September 23, 2005)