Representatives from Vietnam, Cambodia and Laos are gathering at a conference in the Lao province of Khammouane to discuss ways to promote green growth towards sustainable development. Addressing the opening ceremony, Lao National Academy of Social Sciences Representative Dr Thongxalit Manomek highlighted the importance of green growth to nations in the Greater Mekong Sub-region (GMS) in the context that the challenges of poverty, unemployment, and climate change loom large. The seminar focused on food security, water resource and energy interdependence, and how it relates to any future green and sustainable GMS. Delegates considered strategies for sustainable green growth and assessed the environmental impacts of socio-economic development and agriculture in the region. They also emphasized the indispensability of clean industry, green technology application, and clean energy development to pursue the target of green growth. Under the National Strategy on Green Growth, Vietnam targets to reduce its greenhouse gas emissions by 8-10% by 2020 and energy consumption by 1%-1.5% each year. Vietnam is among the first countries in Southeast Asia to introduce such regulation and the first developing country in the Asia-Pacific region to independently formulate its own green growth strategy. (Kinh Te Do Thi – Urban & Economy Oct 30 p12, Vietnamplus.vn Oct 29)
