Increasing businesses’ capacity for technological innovation and raising the competitiveness of green technology are the keys to helping Vietnam integrate more deeply into the global economy, heard a forum in Hanoi on May 28.
Speaking at the forum on technological innovation
towards green development in the business circle, Deputy Minister of Natural
Resources and Environment Nguyen Thi Phuong Hoa said Vietnam is pursuing a
green economy.
With such move, the country aims to reduce
poverty, ease adverse impacts on the environment, generate more jobs and ensure
social equality, she said.
Nguyen The Chinh, head of the Institute of
Strategy and Policy in Natural Resources and Environment, underlined the need
for businesses to grasp the Party’s and State’s new policies and guidelines on
green economy.
The
official explained that there have been various incentives for enterprises to
renovate technologies in order to meet targets set in the National Green Growth
Strategy.
With a range of amended and supplemented policies
and laws, especially once Vietnam effectuates a free trade agreement with
Europe and the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) agreement, technological
innovation towards a green economy is expected to be pushed forward.
Statistics released by the World Bank (WB) show
that Vietnam’s GDP is expected to double in the next decade, resulting in a
three-fold increase in environmental pollution. The figure is forecast to
increase five fold by 2025.
Environmental pollution has directly affected
human health with about 3 percent of GDP spent on health care in 2010.
Participating businesses shared their experience
in technological renovation and obstacles hindering the process, particularly
in green product consumption