Vietnam is making efforts to respond to climate change

Deputy Prime Minister Le Minh Khai has signed Decision No.167/QD-TTg on approving the programme, aiming to increase sustainable development in the private sector, ensuring harmony between economic efficiency and corporate social responsibility and environmental protection, thus contributing to the country’s fulfilment of the 17 UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDG) by 2030.

The programme targets to support about 10,000 private businesses in sustainable development. It will focus on three main activities: Developing an ecosystem supporting sustainable business activities, supporting businesses in their sustainable development, and the programme’s management activities.

Qualified businesses will be supported with training, strategy building, business plans, technology support, human resources development, finance, production, marketing, internal governance, and more.

According to the Vietnam Chamber of Commerce and Industry, sustainable development is no longer something businesses can pay lip service to – it will have to be part of their flesh and blood to improve their ability to cope and recover in all situations.

The UN’s SGDs signify a shared global effort with 17 goals and 169 specific targets. And Vietnam already has a national action plan to integrate these, and goals specific to Vietnam, into documents and resolutions by the National Assembly and the government.

The country has achieved several of these goals 10 years ahead of schedule and achieved a relatively high rank in the region, only behind Thailand. However, there are many tough challenges to achieve the remaining goals. Despite the many advances, only relatively few businesses embrace sustainable development.

Currently, there are about 800,000 enterprises, but only around 0.25 per cent are members of the Vietnam Business Council for Sustainable Development, and only about 12.5 per cent have access to information on sustainable development.