EU, Vietnam to promote sustainable development cooperation
SGGP
The European Chamber of Commerce in Vietnam (EuroCham) this morning held the Green Economy Forum and Exhibition (GEFE) 2022 in Ho Chi Minh City to promote sustainable cooperation between Europe and Vietnam through comprehensive dialogue, investment collaboration, competence sharing and technology transformation.
Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh attends a ribbon cutting ceremony to open Green Economy Forum and Exhibition 2022.
Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh, Minister of Industry and Trade Nguyen Hong Dien, Minister of Natural Resources and Environment Tran Hong Ha, Minister of Agriculture and Rural Development Le Minh Hoan, Chairman of the Ho Chi Minh City People’s Committee Phan Van Mai, representatives of EU members, diplomatic and trade promotion officials, international financial institutions, World Bank, more than 1,000 businesses who are members of EuroCham and Vietnamese enterprises attended the event.
Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh delivers a statement at the conference.
Representatives of EuroCham said that the GEFE 2022 aimed at supporting Vietnam to meet the COO26 commitments and complete the development goals noted in the National Green Growth Strategy from 2021 through 2030. Experts, enterprises and policymakers from Europe, Vietnam and Southeast Asia will join in forums and dialogues between enterprises and the Government with a three-day agenda.
On the first day of the agenda, a plenary conference will take place with the participation of senior leaders of the European and Vietnam Governments who will discuss sustainable development, energy policies and plans and climate crisis management.
A view at the forum
European Commissioner for the Environment, Oceans and Fisheries in the European Commission Virginijus Sinkevičius shared that Vietnam and Europe had potential cooperation in “green” fields. Therefore, the EU desired to collaborate with Vietnam in fighting against climate change, reducing fossil energy consumption, diminution of plastic waste, building a safe food chain, fighting against wildlife trade, implementing green agricultural practice strategies, reducing the use of pesticides, widening forest areas, clean energy usage and so on.
Besides, the two sides may possibly collaborate in the field of logistics, Vietnam's key export industries such as textiles, footwear, wood, machinery and equipment, and mobile phones.
In addition, the EU wished to build a transformation model of waste to green energy, strengthen digital transformation usage to ensure information access for consumers, and apply solutions to reduce emissions in production activities to contribute to reducing net emissions to zero by 2025.
European Commissioner for the Environment, Oceans and Fisheries in the European Commission Virginijus Sinkevičius guaranteed that the EU would join hands with Vietnam to implement the set targets above.
Chairman of the HCMC People’s Committee Phan Van Mai speaks at the conference.
Chairman of the municipal People’s Committee Phan Van Mai stressed that Ho Chi Minh City is the country’s economic hub. During its development, especially the socio-economy recovery process after the Covid-19 pandemic, the city is restructuring economic sectors to overcome challenges and obstacles to catch up with international trends heading to sustainable development.
In fact, HCMC has identified its pioneering responsibility in performing strategies and policies of the country, including the strong commitment of the Prime Minister at the COP26 summit. Accordingly, the city confirmed three specific targets to pursue the green recovery, comprising actively joining into international trends such as open trend, recovery and socio-economic development trends, green transformation and digital transformation trends; developing new economic models including circular economy and knowledge economy and so on.
In addition, the city will issue the recovery and socio-economic development program for the period of 2022 – 2025 aiming to support residents and enterprises and accelerate socio-economic recovery in accordance with the green recovery trend.
Besides, HCMC shall build and implement a green growth strategy for 2021 – 2030 to carry out the sustainable development targets and strive to make the strong commitments on dealing with climate change come true, especially the commitment to get zero net emission by 2050.
Therefore, at the forum, HCMC desires to call for European investors to perform investment in the city following the development orientations above.
Chairman of Ho Chi Minh City People's Committee Phan Van Mai learns about products at the forum.
Chairman Phan Van Mai guaranteed that the city would join hands and create favorable conditions for investors. In addition, the city will also listen to opinions from experts and international institutions on the city's development. Particularly, during the implementation of development targets and guarantees, HCMC desired to receive the companionship and effective collaboration from countries, international institutions, enterprises and international friends and partners.
