Mr. Nguyen Quang Vinh - Vice Chairman of VCCI, Chairman of VBCSD, Member of the National Council for Sustainable Development spoke at the Vietnam Business Forum for Sustainable Development 2024. Photo: Quoc Tuan

We are entering the final quarter of 2024 and the next 3 months are considered to be 3 important months for people, nature and climate as leaders from most countries in the world will attend a series of international summits from now until the end of the year. Typical among the above conferences are the United Nations General Assembly and Climate Week in New York, the United Nations Climate Summit (COP29), ASEAN Summit Week,...

The world enters a new era of development

Last year, Global Stocktake said the world is far from the 1.5°C target and is heading for a catastrophic 2.9°C of warming by the end of the century, or even 4°C if countries fail to implement their current climate plans.

In 2023 alone, the world lost 3.7 million hectares of primary tropical forest, the equivalent of 10 football fields every minute. Many say 2024 offers the last chance to achieve a better future.

That was once again emphasized by General Secretary and President To Lam in his speech at the Future Summit in New York at the end of September, that “We are facing a historic opportunity to bring the world into a new era, a new era of better development, for progressive development, social justice, for a prosperous, free and happy life for the people when we unite in awareness, action, efforts and close and effective cooperation”.

Also according to the General Secretary and President, the world's sustainable development goals (SDGs) and human interests must be placed at the center, as our highest goals. In the current context, the inevitability and urgency of the SDGs are undeniable. The world has only more than 1,900 days left to strive towards realizing the 2030 Agenda (Agenda 2030). According to the “SDG Report 2023: Special Edition” of the United Nations, more than 30% of the goals have not made any progress, even regressed compared to the 2015 baseline.

That said, countries need to cooperate and take more drastic actions to get closer to realizing the 17 SDGs. In particular, a stronger commitment and more active participation of the business community in sustainable business and responsible business is extremely necessary.

Now, instead of seeing sustainable development and profit as “two sides of the coin”, businesses should consider it a “balanced equation”, supporting and complementing each other.

Transforming the Business Community

Also in September, at the invitation of the World Business Council for Sustainable Development (WBCSD), I attended the WBCSD Annual Board Meeting, which was held at the same time as the Climate Week series of events in New York.

One of the main topics of this meeting was the efforts towards reducing carbon emissions of the global business community. In addition, the discussions also focused on promoting corporate accountability and performance; addressing physical risks in the value chain; and highlighting the challenges and opportunities for transformational change.

I was impressed by the number of 6,046 businesses, representing more than a third of the global market capitalization, that have established science-based targets to reduce their greenhouse gas emissions, of which 75% are in Scope 3.

A series of global initiatives and platforms have been introduced and responded to by the global business community, such as the Global Circularity Protocol - a framework to promote action, providing guidance for businesses in setting targets, measuring, reporting and disclosing information on efforts to implement the circular economy and resource efficiency; or the WBCSD Decarbonization Demand Accelerator, with the participation of WBCSD member companies, aiming to promote the transformation of the industrial sector towards Net Zero.

These evidences show that the global business community is actively and urgently transforming from a “gray” economy to a “green” and sustainable economy.

Mastering the “business game”

With a clear awareness of climate risks, the risks of inaction, a long-term vision and a firm belief in the long-term benefits of PTBV, pioneering enterprises not only meet regulations, perform well in accountability, but also create new values when they are ready to go beyond compliance.

From there, they establish their own position as shapers and masters of the “business game” in the era of green transformation. This is also the direction that Vietnamese enterprises need to learn if they want to break through in the new era.

VCCI has always been a pioneer, persistent in its efforts to support and promote businesses to transform, practice responsible and sustainable production and business. In the new context towards green transformation and the Net Zero goal, VCCI has been demonstrating more strongly its role as a factor promoting synchronous transformation through policy recommendations; connecting domestic and international economic trade; building and disseminating sets of indexes such as the Provincial Green Index (PGI), the Corporate Sustainability Index (CSI) or the Sustainable Industrial Park Index (SIP Index) which are currently being finalized for implementation.

I believe that the efforts of VCCI and the business community will be important “pieces” in the “picture” of synchronous transformation to move towards a green, equitable, inclusive future and break through to new heights.