Global calls for green action

The drumbeat is growing louder for a shift to green technology and infrastructure throughout the world, including in Cambodia, which is still mostly reliant on “brown” energy consumption as it hopes to balance cost-efficient development with sustainable technology.

At an Asian Vision Institute (AVI) webinar on Cambodia’s efforts to achieve its sustainable development goals (SDGs), Minister of Environment Say Sam Al noted that it doesn’t have to be a black-and-white choice between sustainability and development.

“We do not need to choose between economic growth or environmental protection,” Sam Al said, before adding that a balanced approach could allow for both expanded development and a cleaner environment.

The AVI webinar came on the heels of a virtual leader summit organised by United States President Joe Biden last Friday, during which the world’s two largest polluters China and the US, achieved common ground on their vision for a greener future.

However, financing a green revolution is something both the US and China, also owners of the two largest economies on earth, are better equipped financially to carry out than Cambodia.

While the pandemic has sapped financial resources in Cambodia and the world over, there are financial instruments available, United Nations Resident Coordinator of Cambodia Paulene Tamesis said during the AVI webinar.

She said there are financial vehicles to be utililised in the Kingdom, even though the government has footed much of the bill for the pandemic response.

Tamesis added the UN and its partners are working on an integrated national funding framework “to ensure financing architectures are geared up towards the interconnected goals of the development priorities of the government, first and foremost and supporting funding for the SDGs”.

She said this includes soliciting private investments, philanthropic giving and green bonds.

Green bonds have not been fully optimised because Cambodia is still a dollarised economy, she added.

“We’re hoping that the first issuance of bonds will also be really focused on the green economy infrastructure as well and support the leapfrogging of investments in green infrastructure rather than to the brown or traditional economies that fuelled growth in Cambodia in the past.”

There are examples of businesses big and small taking the lead in the Kingdom, such as Coca-Cola’s factory located in the Phnom Penh Special Economic Zone (PPSEZ) which on average is powered by 32 percent solar energy. At the time of its completion in 2016, the solar panel field was the largest in Cambodia.

Coca-Cola has spawned other initiatives as well, including its stated goals in 2018 to recycle one bottle or can for each one the company sells by 2030.

David Wigglesworth , the chief executive officer of Cambodia Beverage Co, a wholly owned subsidiary of The Coca-Cola Co, said Coca-Cola is committed to creating a circular economy and has partnered with recycling companies to encourage people to drop off plastic by offering them compensation per kilogramme.

“In a nutshell, we want to move to 100 percent recycled inputs and create circular economies,” he said.

He added the initiative could help to create an informal collectors industry of recyclables that would then grow by itself.

A trend towards green is taking place at much smaller businesses as well, including Melvin Care Dentistry in the capital.

Dr Chamnam Nam met the owner of SL Supplier, a local company specialising in supplying branded goods, at an entrepreneur competition in 2019.

Afterwards, he and his family became regular customers at the dentistry and recently, she decided to exchange dental services for environmentally-friendly dental products such as bamboo toothbrushes and recyclable mugs provided by SL to be given out to customers.

“In dentistry, I have seen a lot of plastic medical waste such as gloves, syringes and aprons, which we need to wear as PPE [personal protective equipment] during procedures. That’s why I thought of choosing any products that can be recycled or less polluting to our environment,” she said.

Banks in the ASEAN region are hopping onboard the green train as well, most notably Singapore-based DBS Bank, which earlier this month became the first bank in Singapore to commit to phasing out thermal coal from its portfolio by 2039.

It’s already taken action by refusing to accept customers who make more than 25 percent of their revenue from thermal coal immediately. By January 2026, it will stop extending credit to customers who derive more than 50 percent of their revenue from thermal coal.

Locally, ABA Bank adheres to environmental and social lending principles that only provide lending to “harmless” businesses which don’t negatively affect the environment.

The bank does not lend to companies that produce logging equipment, use unsustainable forms of fishing, or companies that promote cross-border trade in waste products, among others, according to the bank’s Chief Marketing Officer Igor Zimarev.

Companies profiting from coal were absent from ABA’s list, however, and it remains the biggest cloud overhanging all green initiatives in the world.

When US envoy on climate John Kerry visited Shanghai earlier this month, coal was on the agenda as the US side pushed for China to stop building coal plants and financing international coal plant projects.

Meanwhile, China pushed for the US to invest more in developing countries to enable them to develop more environmentally friendly technology.

Cambodia appears to be caught in the middle, lured by cheap and efficient coal-powered energy while clearly recognising the imminent need to push for other sources of power.

For now, money is still being poured into coal. The Council for the Development of Cambodia last month approved the Huadian Sihanoukville Power Generation Co Ltd’s $1.28 billion 700 megawatt coal-fired power plant.

While smaller investments in alternative energy have also been approved, work needs to be done to achieve an energy balance.

According to the Electricity Authority of Cambodia, in 2020, 3.28 percent of electricity from the national grid was generated by solar, 54.8 percent by coal and oil and about 41 percent by hydropower.

In April last year, a moratorium was called on all hydropower projects on the Mekong River to avoid causing damage to the region’s most important river.

Source: khmertimeskh