Solutions to establish a green ecosystem in the logistics industry

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Mr. Dao Trong Khoa

How do you evaluate the impact of the logistics industry on the environment?

The urgency of green transformation comes from the Government's commitments, and also from market and customer requirements. When participating in the supply chains of international customers, they have set requirements related to strategies, measures, and actions to control emissions from businesses. Therefore, it must be recognized that the greening of the logistics chain is coming much faster than the committed roadmap. Vietnam's logistics industry must go ahead and achieve Net Zero before the 2050 mark.

The logistics and transportation industry is responsible for 1/3 of emissions, so when implementing Net zero commitments, greening the logistics industry is urgent and must be prioritized. In particular, in Vietnam, road transport is mainly developed while this type accounts for 85% of emissions. Therefore, this definitely needs to be a priority area, especially improving the waste problem of the road sector. Then other related logistics fields such as warehousing and international transportation must also be included in the reduction roadmap. Along with cutting inflation is optimizing the transport model; that is promoting green transport models, such as railway transport, inland waterway transport...

In your opinion, what are the limitations of businesses when implementing green transformation?

In the logistics industry, "going green" is no longer a trend but has become a mandatory requirement for businesses. Vietnamese logistics businesses need to take advantage and make greening a driving force and urgent requirement to improve competitiveness, enhance brand image, towards more sustainable and comprehensive development in business activities, global trade and import-export.

When going green, businesses definitely need initial investment. For example, when a warehouse or yard business wants to "green" its operations, it can switch to installing rooftop electricity, using electric forklifts... the initial investment can be more costly financially and the effectiveness does not come immediately, but in the long term, it will have an impact on fuel savings, operational optimization, and especially increasing the number of customers, increasing revenue and cutting costs and enhancing competitiveness

Talking about green transformation must go hand in hand with digital transformation. The application of information technology in business activities of Vietnamese enterprises is still far away from international standards. Applying technology in digital transformation will certainly cause cost pressure first, but operational efficiency will compensate for the costs spent.

Challenges in financial resources, human resource qualifications and skills as well as management issues are also bottlenecks for businesses in the green transformation process. We regularly advise customers and businesses to invest in digital technology and green transformation. In fact, it is an investment for the future and it is certainly an effective investment problem.

In fact, what efforts have member businesses of the Association made in green transformation?

Many businesses have become aware of the role of green logistics in sustainable development to have a development orientation for this activity. The Logistics 2022 report shows that up to 73.2% of businesses said green logistics is part of their business strategy. This shows that many businesses are aware of the role of green logistics in sustainable development to have a development orientation for this activity. In addition, nearly 65% ​​of businesses participating in the survey also said they implemented environmental controls at their businesses. Evidence of the interest of logistics businesses in green transformation is that we have large businesses that have developed green ports, mobile post offices, green warehouses... Meanwhile, small and medium-sized businesses with the advantage flexibility has also been responding to the green logistics trend, spreading meaningful messages about the environment and implementing sustainable development strategies in import and export activities.

However, although there is a mechanism for development, the implementation of regulations in practice is still not very effective. Besides, current regulations and policies only focus on road transport. Meanwhile, logistics is a chain of services. Limited regulations related to other types of logistics infrastructure such as warehouses or information technology systems lead to a lack of uniformity in the application and implementation of green logistics. In addition, policies on production processes to ensure the development of green logistics are still very limited, especially regulations on recycling, repair and recovery of waste, recycling and development of environmentally friendly packaging…

Meanwhile, limited logistics infrastructure related to transportation vehicles and transportation networks is also a bottleneck. Vietnam has mainly developed road transport while this type accounts for 85% of emissions.

In your opinion, what support is needed in terms of mechanisms and policies for businesses?

The journey of green transformation and digital transformation for small and medium-sized enterprises is always challenging because they lack financial resources, qualifications, human resource skills as well as management issues. Therefore, national programs such as digital transformation and green transformation need to aim at supporting small and medium-sized enterprises with incentive and incentive plans and programs. For example, there are preferential policies to access capital more easily when businesses make green transformation. In addition, training programs of ministries and departments focus on small businesses and need to focus on specific issues...