Has Australia let Chinese climate change policymakers down, given the announcement this week by Prime Minister Kevin Rudd that Australia will cut greenhouse gas emissions by a modest 5 per cent by 2020? That decision will no doubt disappoint one senior Chinese climate change official, Pan Jiahua of the Experts Committee for Climate Change, who observed earlier this month that a developed country like Australia should be looking to cut its emissions by as much as 25 per cent by 2020. 'If we do not have these targets, I think we would go away from Copenhagen [next year's world climate conference] empty-handed. Outsiders would say: it [Australia] is acting like a developing country - it is very strange ... If you cannot do it, how can you ask us to do it?' Dr Pan told The Age newspaper on December 8. China and Australia have much to gain commercially and diplomatically from working together to combat climate change. Last month, they held their first dialogue on the subject, which is designed to be an annual event. They discussed strategies for co-operating on clean-energy technologies, backed the Kyoto Protocol on climate change and pledged support for the Copenhagen conference. The Australian government's chief adviser on climate change, Ross Garnaut, has a different view to that of Dr Pan on whether Australia should make large emissions cuts that would inspire Beijing to follow suit. Such tit-for-tat exchanges of reductions between countries would represent a failure to forge a consensus on the principles that are needed to underpin any enforceable and meaningful international climate change agreement, Professor Garnaut says. 'In the absence of clear and widely supported principles, each country [would] develop reasons it should carry less than its proportionate share of the burden of mitigation,' he said. While Professor Garnaut is right at the policy level, perception is everything in politics and diplomacy - or nearly everything. The Rudd government's decision to cut emissions by only 5 per cent over the next decade might not be helpful to those both inside and outside China who are urging Beijing to make larger cuts. That is the view of Australian scientist Tim Flannery, who is working with the Copenhagen Climate Council. Professor Flannery said last week that, if Australia set an example through deep cuts in emissions, it would affect Beijing's approach. China, he thinks, is beginning to see an economic upside to the development of renewable energy. Ironically, there are some in Australia who believe Mr Rudd opted for the 5 per cent emissions cuts because he does not want to worsen the impact on an Australian economy already feeling the chill winds of a prolonged Chinese slowdown. Not that Dr Pan would be impressed with that excuse. Greg Barns is a political commentator in Australia and a former Australian government adviser