Duy Tan Recycling's plastic bottle recycling line. Photo: TL

Responsibility and market

For Vietnam's "billion-dollar" textile and garment export item, since March 2022, the European Union (EU) has proposed a Strategy for the circular and sustainable textile and garment industry to ensure that by 2030, textile and garment products entering the EU market “having a long lifespan, can be recycled and are mainly made from recycled fibers”. Therefore, a series of policies have been issued by the EU.

Not only textiles, many consumer goods, electronics… must also apply EU recycling standards with the requirement on using recycled materials in product packaging, minimizing waste and ensuring that products can be effectively recycled after their life cycle.

Along with the EU, many large markets have also begun to issue similar requirements as well as have measures to control goods more strictly.

In response to the above requirements, many enterprises have proactively applied recycling standards in the production process.

According to Mr. Vang Vien Thong, CEO of fashion brand from the recycled material REPEET, the company is making efforts to reduce carbon emissions, reduce plastic waste discharged into the environment and optimize water consumption in textile production.

Instead of using polyester derived from petroleum, REPEET produces sustainable fashion products from recycled polyester fibers sourced in Vietnam.s

The company has built a supply chain from collection, classification, recycling, fiber production, weaving to fashion products, contributing to reducing 57% of carbon emissions and saving 70% of water consumption.

Mr. Thong emphasized that using 10 tons of REPEET fabric contributed to recycling nearly 1.45 million PET plastic bottles, reducing carbon emissions into the environment equivalent to a car running 57,000 km, while saving 70,000 liters of water.

With this strategy, Mr. Vang Vien Thong believes that he will conquer not only the domestic market but also expand to demanding markets such as Japan, the US and Europe - where product quality and sustainable, environmentally friendly criteria are always top priorities.

At Masan High-Tech Materials (MHT), the company's leader also says that MHT applies the 3Rs model "Reduce - Reuse - Recycle" to all production and operation activities, improving towards the goal of minimizing waste and optimizing resources.

MHT classifies waste during operations to recycle into new product lines with a recycling rate of more than 30% of the total waste generated.

MHT is currently conducting experiments to evaluate the efficient exploitation of secondary Vonfram supplies in the future, and is collaborating on research projects in Brazil to recycle low-grade Vonfram tailings and waste streams from the cement and other industries.

MHT leaders said that in the context of China restricting exports of important minerals, many Western partners were forced to find new sources of supply, opening up great opportunities for Vonfram producers outside of China.

Especially as demand for Vonfram is growing strongly due to its important role in the global green transition, especially in the production of wind turbines, electric vehicle batteries and solar panels.

At Heineken Vietnam, Ms. Tran Ngoc Anh, Senior External Affairs Director, said that for packaging, the Company reused up to 97% of glass bottles and 99% of plastic crates; at the same time, it cooperates with suppliers and recyclers for projects from “Aluminum Cans to Aluminum Cans”. Ms. Anh emphasized that in the coming time, it would continue to improve packaging, increase the use of recycled materials and increase recovery and reuse.

Cost and awareness barriers

However, the application of recycling standards in production is still difficult, especially for small and medium enterprises.

One of the main reasons is the initial investment cost for changing production technology as well as building waste management and recycling systems that meet high international standards. Besides, awareness is also a big challenge.

Many Vietnamese enterprises still do not fully understand the long-term benefits of applying recycling standards.

In addition, the representative of Heineken Vietnam also raised the challenge of lacking recycling infrastructure as well as the market for recycled products. For example, Vietnam did not have a factory producing aluminum coil from recycled aluminum, so most aluminum coil with recycled aluminum content was still imported from abroad to produce aluminum cans domestically.

At the same time, this is a task in the value chain, so there must be coordination from partners to raise awareness of sustainable development.

Therefore, experts and enterprises believe that policies and incentives are needed to encourage investment in regeneration and sustainable development.

In particular, management agencies need to promote the application of green production technologies and recycling technologies into enterprises' production processes as well as provide full information on environmental standards and requirements of international markets.

On the enterprise side, proactively learning to transform and boldly investing are essential, but along with that, it is necessary to find a way to link and transfer between large enterprises and small and medium enterprises to work together in implementation, thereby increasing product value, sustainable development and expanding export markets.