This is the 10th Forum organized by the Vietnam Confederation of Trade and Industry (VCCI), the Viet Nam Business Council for Sustainable Development (VBCSD).
Increase revenue and competitiveness
Net Zero emissions by 2050 is a major goal of the Government of Vietnam, to contribute to the global joint effort to adapt to the climate change. Not only a political commitment, Net Zero has become a new trend in restructuring economies towards low carbon, along with economic development and environmental protection.
According to Mr. Nguyen Quang Vinh - Vice Chairman of VCCI - President of VBCSD, facing the requirements of sustainable development, the business community needs to redefine: The success of an enterprise is not only in financial numbers but also in the ability to adapt, withstand and recover from unprecedented climate change challenges. Businesses need to link their success, long-term growth with sustainable benefits of the community, society and environment.
Sharing about the increasing requirements on environmental factors in production and business, Mr. Nguyen Trung Anh - Director of Research, Development and Sustainable Development, PAN Group said that the following Net Zero commitment to the world has called for businesses to participate in realizing the common goal of the country. 1,912 large emitting enterprises must carry out a greenhouse gas inventory and develop a plan to reduce emissions in the coming years. PAN's member companies are not included in this group, but adopting low emission models will help the Group comply with the Government's green development requirements.
The pressure to be greener and cleaner from customers is also quite large. Typically, many customers from the EU attach great importance to the carbon footprint of their products. As such, suppliers must implement a carbon inventory and reduce the carbon footprint of their products.
Besides, enterprises themselves also have needs for efficiency in production and business such as reducing costs, saving resources and optimizing production processes. This is also the motivation for businesses to apply low-emission economic models.
The benefits businesses will see immediately when applying solutions at the factory level, which is cost savings and emission reduction. By optimizing resources, reducing fertilizer and water in agricultural cultivation, using renewable energy and increasing equipment efficiency, PAN can save tens of billions of dong per year.
Besides, revenue and profit both increased due to 2 reasons. Firstly, brand value increases when the product is brought to the international market and can penetrate higher value markets. Secondly, the use of waste products and by-products also brings great revenue. For example, every year, PAN's company has thousands of tons of shrimp shells after processing. Instead of processing costs, the Group cooperates with other companies to process it into animal feed, and has an additional revenue of about VND 15 billion per year.
Attracting green investment capital
Another remarkable benefit from the company's compliance with environmental and social regulations is that it can attract investors for its production and business activities. Mr. Vu Chi Cong - Director, Head of ESG Department, Vinacapital Group said that green capital is currently quite abundant, but investment opportunities in Vietnam are not many. The problem is that businesses have not been able to provide their own sources of information and data on sustainable development such as publicizing information on products and labels about the source of raw materials. When the investment funds approached, they had no basis to know if the operating business was in accordance with the green investment criteria.
Currently, only large enterprises can do this, small businesses can do it on a simpler scale. According to Mr. Vu Chi Cong, businesses need to reconsider how their business fields have an impact on sustainable development, both positive and negative. With negative impact, what will be the solution? From there, to have the orientation to record and update necessary information and data, such as greenhouse gas inventory information. Enterprises that do well in inventory, storage and disclosure of information will have a greater advantage.
According to Ms. Dang Thi Hong Hanh - CEO of Viet Nam Energy and Environment Consulting Joint Stock Company (VNEEC), in order to move towards Net Zero, the most important issue is the perception of businesses, especially for leading enterprises.
Over time, difficulties in technology and resources will gradually be solved. Currently, VNEEC is coordinating with MONRE to organize training courses on greenhouse gas inventory to help businesses prepare to participate in the carbon market. For the new EU regulation on carbon tracing, the EU has also opened a portal for businesses subject to this regulation and has training courses, with detailed instructions on how to import and export from the EU into Vietnam.
In terms of resources, according to Ms. Hanh, there will be many new opportunities through global green investment funds and from new State policies to promote green capital, investment in emission reduction and Net Zero. The transformation of new technology, in addition to improving competitiveness, also helps businesses have more income from carbon credits, contributing to the national goal of reducing emissions.
At the Forum, representatives of businesses and investors all said that the State should play a leading role and become a pedestal for businesses. Specifically, there are policies and guidelines on emission reduction, support for strengthening technical capacity and access to capital. At the same time, building a stable policy system, especially in the energy sector, is a prerequisite for the success of the process of reducing greenhouse gas emissions.