On September 1, 2021, the 6th China Green Innovation Competition and Green Innovation Program was featured in China Environment News and the original article is reproduced below:

"The eight teams showed very wonderful green innovation practices and kudos to the students." Chen Wei, deputy director of the Science and Technology and International Cooperation Department of the Shanghai Bureau of Ecology and Environment, said at the 6th China Green Innovation Competition, which ended recently.

The competition aimed to achieve the goal of "promoting green development and harmonious coexistence between human beings and nature" as stated in the 14th Five-Year Plan and the outline of the 2035 Vision, and the 27 participants of the 2021 Summer Institute of China Green Innovation (SICGI) The 27 participants of the 2021 Summer Institute of China Green Innovation (SICGI) proposed 8 innovative solutions to issues such as biodiversity science, household disposal of expired medicines, car battery disposal and product carbon labeling.

To get students "feet in the mud"

This summer, the college students' SICGI journey consisted of 3 parts: theory study, internship research, and innovation competition.

In just 8 weeks, it condenses the curriculum, methodological training, field research, writing training and other talent training sessions. The training breaks through the constraints of professional fields, industries, and departmental responsibilities to inspire more creative solutions. Students met face-to-face with the makers of laws, regulations, and policy documents to learn about the introduction of the Environmental Protection Law, the revision of the Law on the Prevention and Control of Solid Waste Pollution, and the construction of pilot waste-free cities, and to see the difference between desk research and practical application.

With the help of the Ministry of Ecology and Environment, the participants not only met face-to-face with academician Su Jilan, Mr. Mark Ping and other experts and scholars in the field of environmental protection to talk about the marine blue economy and biodiversity conservation, but also went into the factory workshops and fields to observe up close how the various departments work together and how each body can achieve the integration of ecological environmental protection and economic development, and to discover cutting-edge issues and summarize fresh experiences in practice. Beijing, Lishui, Hangzhou, Foshan, Fengcheng, Yingtan and other places have left their footprints on the students' research and practice.

Chen Ling, SICGI's academic advisor and appointed associate professor of public administration at Tsinghua University, said, "I strongly agree with the notion that in the process of field research, students must be allowed to 'get their feet in the mud' and go to farmlands, streams, and the front line to observe problems and discover them. Through classroom learning and local practice, they can observe the real situation in the environment and economic and social development up close, provide whimsical ideas from young people for grassroots ecological and environmental protection workers, and provide basic data and case references for the work of local environmental protection departments."

8 projects focus on pressing environmental issues

What topics are in focus for the participants' green innovation solutions?

The participants of the Volvo Evergreen team were concerned that the second round of the third batch of central ecological and environmental protection inspectors carried out in the first half of this year found and notified and criticized the lack of implementation of fertilizer reduction in many places, mainly involving unauthorized relaxation of fertilizer reduction targets, falsification of soil formula data, and falsification of fertilizer use data. Irrational fertilizer application behavior will lead to soil consolidation, and water eutrophication, affect the quality and safety of agricultural products, threaten human health, and destroy biodiversity and ecosystem balance. How can fertilizer producers, distributors, farmers, and recycling stations monitor each other to achieve reduction and increase efficiency? It became the focus of the team's thinking.

The Green Fertilizer Agricultural Sales team, on the other hand, is concerned with the issue of green agricultural products. In life, people may encounter these dilemmas: the credibility of green agricultural products is doubtful, green agricultural products are "high quality but not high price", and agricultural products sold on e-commerce platforms are "low price to guarantee quantity". How to gather the consumer demand for green agricultural products, increase the recognition of green agricultural products by consumers, and thus increase the enthusiasm of producers for the development of green agriculture? The participants used this as an entry point for their research.

In addition, the environmental medicine recycling team focused on the collection and disposal of expired drugs from household sources; the sudden team focused on the dilemma of low car recycling rate, market capture by informal enterprises, and backward industry technology level in the end-of-life car recycling and dismantling industry; the 100,000-volt team was concerned about the current situation of opaque market for recycling used power batteries of new energy vehicles, high cost of recycling by enterprises and difficulty of recycling by formal enterprises; the Great Yu team explored the possibility of incorporating natural flood management model into our

The NEO WETLANDS team explored the path to raise awareness of biodiversity conservation in the post-2020 era, and the Lead Carbon team studied the labeling of low-carbon products.

Liu Kan, Deputy Director of the Secretariat of the China Council for International Cooperation on Environment and Development, said, "I was very happy to get the students' reports, and their concerns fit very well with domestic and international environmental hotspots and the concerns of the NCC."

Wang Yuzhen, head of the ecological section of the Chun'an Branch of the Hangzhou Ecological Environment Bureau in Zhejiang Province, also commented, "The eight practice topics closely follow the current direction, difficulties, and shortcomings in the promotion of ecological and environmental protection work, and are also the main points of work that urgently need to be optimized and improved at the grassroots level."

Design solutions can be commercially applied

What are the highlights of the participants' innovative solutions?

The first-prize winning team, Lead Carbon, focused on leading low-carbon consumption and designed the "Visual Product Carbon Factor Label" solution. It calculates the low-carbon index of products, presents low-carbon production practices to consumers in a visual way, promotes low-carbon consumption behavior of the public and gives feedback to enterprises to promote low-carbon transformation. A small label brings together various industries and thousands of households, and also unites the joint efforts to reduce global warming.

Dong Yu, executive vice president and senior researcher at Tsinghua University's China Development Planning Institute, said with delight, "Congratulations to the Lead Carbon team, such a solution is very likely to be applied commercially."

Like Team Lead Carbon, the innovative solutions of several teams reflected Internet thinking. The 100,000 Volts team designed a comprehensive battery trading information service platform based on online trading on the Internet to create a new model of automotive power battery recycling; the Green Fertilizer Farm Sale team designed the "Beloved Farm" online platform based on the partner crowdfunding model to help produce and sell green agricultural products.

"The eight research programs show us the general direction of digital transformation to empower ecological and environmental governance and improve governance." Chen Wei said.

"What was surprising was the participants' solutions, which were not only technical but also policy-oriented." Friends of Nature Executive Director Zhang Boju said.

For example, to promote biodiversity communication and education, the NEO WETLANDS team proposed creating a special committee led by the local science association, uniting multiple subjects from multiple sectors such as ecology and environment, education, and NGOs and enterprises to collaborate on governance, using the outline of the National Science Quality Action Plan as a grip, science popularization infrastructure such as science and technology museums as a carrier, and science popularizers and science and technology volunteers as a living force. "I think it's very creative." Wang Yuzhen pointed out that if the pilot can be carried out in conjunction with the current trend of biodiversity conservation and the needs of grassroots work, it is quite a reference value for grassroots work.

The competition is not the end, and SICGI organizers and experts will coach students to rewrite their green innovation proposals into policy references, academic papers, business plans, patent applications, etc., and seek the possibility of implementing them on the ground by matching them in various ways. Zhang Boju, who has served as a judge for six consecutive years, said, "Innovation is not only for the competition, but I hope to show students that their enthusiasm, professionalism and innovation can contribute more to solving practical problems."

Original address: http://epaper.cenews.com.cn/html/2021-09/01/node_6.htm