I was pleased to cap my chairmanship of the ASEAN Committee in Washington (ACW) by holding a forum on environmental policy and public-private cooperation, which I co-moderated with Kevin Moss, the global director of the World Resources Institute (WRI) Business Center.
Joining us for the event held at the Philippine Chancery Annex Building were executives from some of the biggest companies in the US such as Mars Inc.’s sustainability global director Kevin Rabinovitch and climate and land senior manager Ashley Allen; Shell international government relations director Eric Pelofsky, The Walt Disney Company policy strategy director Emily Cichy, Walmart global government affairs senior director Sarah Thorn and Johnson Controls VP for global sustainability and industry initiatives Clay Nesler.
Clay Nesler (extreme left) delivers comments while Izzat Zakaria, Emily Cichy and Kevin Rabinovitch intently listen.
Also present were fellow ASEAN diplomats in Washington that include Ambassadors Mai Sayavongs of Laos, Aung Lynn of Myanmar and Ha Kim Ngoc of Vietnam as well as representatives from the Embassies of Brunei, Cambodia, Indonesia, Malaysia, Singapore and Thailand.
Everyone will agree that public-private cooperation is important — if not critical — in meeting the sustainability-related objectives of governments. Hopefully, the initiative will contribute in further deepening the economic engagement of the US with the member-countries of ASEAN and the region, with the open discussions during the forum creating an impetus for all sectors to work together and engage even more.
One of the discussion highlights was on the issue of sustainable smart cities. For its part, the Philippines has enacted complementary sectoral policies and programs that include the strengthening of buildings and infrastructure standards, adoption of the “build back better” approach, and promotion of energy efficiency and renewable energy standards to deepen the climate response. Partnerships with various stakeholders in the academe, civil society and the private sector were also pursued to harmonize national policies with the local development systems and processes and enhance the capacity of local government units.
Eric Pelofsky, Murni Abd Hamid and Sarah Thorn.
The WRI, which is a Washington-based global research group that partners with various entities to promote sustainability, envisions a world in which all cities become sustainable environments for people and economies to thrive. The UN projects that an additional 2.5 billion people will be living in cities by 2050. However, we must also remember that urbanization brings with it a host of challenges and issues that include poverty, congestion, pollution and inequality, not to mention safety and security.
The forum went very well, with participants sharing the initiatives that their respective companies are doing to promote sustainability, giving everyone a wider perspective on, and a deeper understanding of, each other’s priorities and objectives — in order for all of us to collectively chart where our cooperation should lead in the years to come.