BEIJING - China will strive for green, as well as balanced, coordinated and sustainable growth in its next five-year development plan period, Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao said Thursday.

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"We are determined to take more effective measures to build a resource-saving and environment-friendly society," Wen said in his meeting with foreign participants of the annual meeting of the China Council for International Cooperation on Environment and Development (CCICED).

He told the development experts that China highly values environmental protection and has stepped up work to reshape development concepts and related laws and regulations to curb pollution. Positive results have been made.

Wen said there are still big challenges ahead.

On behalf of the participants, CCICED Executive Vice-Chair Margaret Biggs, also president of the Canadian International Development Agency, applauded China's efforts to achieve the United Nations' Millennium Development Goals (MDG).

The CCICED was established in 1992. It is an environment consulting organization composed of officials and experts from home and abroad that gives policy advice to the Chinese government.