Asia-Europe Environment Forum - Day 1
The Hanns Seidel Foundation was represented by its highest representative, Chairwoman Prof. Ursula Männle (second from the left)
Hanns Seidel Foundation together with Asia-Europe Foundation, foundation of all members of the ASEM process, the Institute for Global Environmental Strategies (IGES) of Japan, and the ASEM SME Eco-Innovation Center of Korea has a long-standing partnership in organizing the bi-annual Asia-Europe Environment Forum. This year, it is held in Hanoi, Vietnam, with the topic: Sustainable Development Goals and Financing: No Longer Business as Usual. The conference was hosted by Hanns Seidel Foundation Vietnam under Dr. Axel Neubert and his excellent team, but to underscore the importance of the conference and the issues at stake Prof. Ursula Männle, chairwoman of Hanns Seidel Foundation in Munich, opened the event. Dr. Bernhard Seliger, representative of Hanns Seidel Foundation in Korea, also participated in the conference, as a speaker in the panel on SDG financing on the national level.
The first day was opened by the conference organizers. Ambassador Karsten Warnecke, Executive Director of ASEF, opened the forum, which brought together 150 experts from almost 50 countries. Prof. Ursula Männle, Chairwoman of Hanns Seidel Foundation, highlighted capacity-building on SDG as an important contribution of the foundation to their implementation. Tetsuro Yoshida of IGES and Dr. Mi-Hoon Jeong of the ASEM SME Eco-Innovation Center also gave welcoming remarks. Afterwards, Nguyen The Phuong, Deputy Minister in the Ministry of Planning and Investment of Vietnam, gave a keynote speech, focusing on Vietnam`s transition from a developing to the a low-middle-income country and the difficulties in securing finance for developing in this transition phase.
The first session, moderated by a Surendra Shrestha, Vice President of the Asian Institute of Technology in Bangkok and a long-standing partner of the conference series, looked into issues of financial support as a driving force of the implementation of SDG. Grazyna Pulawska, project manager at ASEF in Singapore, looked into almost ten years of cooperation with HSF in raising awareness for SDG and consulting in particular the so-called CVLM countries (Cambodia, Vietnam, Laos, Myanmar) on SDG. Alejandro Montalban, head of cooperation section at the EU Delegation to Vietnam, focused on the European cooperation with Vietnam on SDG, in particular in the field of energy policy. Jonathan Dunn, resident representative of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) in Vietnam, looked at domestic sources of finance, i.e. public finance and its efficient use, as well as international public and private resources, which require among others transparency, macroeconomic stability and business-friendly environment. Finally, Dr. Debapriya Bhattacharya, distinguished fellow at the Centre for Policy Dialogue in Bangladesh, discussed tensions of private and public finance for development.
The second session was moderated by Prof. Laszlo Pinter, of the Central European University in Hungary, and looked into financing SDG. It saw presentations by Nguyen Le Thuy, Deputy Director General in the Ministry of Planning and Investment of Vietnam, David Timis, Growth Engine Manager of Google in Romania, and Le Thanh Thao, National Programme Officer at UNIDO Vietnam.
The third session showed examples for making the 2030 Agenda work across various countries. It was shared by Dr. Jong-Soo Yoon, head of the UNOSD office in Korea. Marja Innanen, Deputy Secretary General at the Ministerial Advisor National Commission on Sustainable Development at the Prime Minister´s Office of Finland, offered a view on a people-centered approach to SDG. Naoko Ueda, Deputy Director at the Development Centre of OECD discussed measuring the progress on SDG by multi-dimensional country reviews and recommendations for progress. Florian Beranek, Lead Expert Societal Responsibility and RBC, in the UNIDO country office of Vietnam, pleaded for a down-to-earth, free-of-jargon message of implementing SDG, in particular with relation to business. Daniele Ponzi, technical advisor and chair of the Environment Thematic Group Committee at the Asian Development Bank in Manila, looked at the slow, but steady increase of green finance opportunities in East Asia.
The sessions were followed by three workshops on public private partnerships for the 2030 Agenda, corporate approaches to multistakeholder partnerships, as well as SDG business interlinkages.