Designing products to be easily recycled, creating new technologies for smarter workplaces, and learning from the past—these are among the suggestions heard at this year’s Eco Action Day roundtable on how companies can apply the principles of Sustainable Development Goal 9 (SDG).
For the fifth year in a row, the annual Eco Action Day campaign by Ricoh Asia Pacific was brought to a close with an industry roundtable. Titled Industry Innovation in the Year of Climate Action, the dialogue gathered government representatives, business leaders and academics to discuss how to build resilient infrastructure, promote inclusive and sustainable industrialisation, and foster innovation for a more sustainable Singapore.
The discussion was based on the focus areas of SDG 9, which are industry, innovation and infrastructure. The Goal is one of 17 ambition goals put forth by the United Nations to reduce poverty, improve living standards and protect the environment by 2030.
Maggie Lee, corporate partnership strategist from World Wide Fund for Nature, questioned the concept of ‘zero waste’ for companies and societies. She asked: “We know that product recyclability can never reach 100 per cent, and we know that some [end up as trash] in oceans and landfills. Zero waste is a goal, but can it actually be achieved at the post-consumer stage?”
Meanwhile Kazuhisa Goto, managing director of Ricoh Asia Pacific, highlighted in his address the power of businesses to make change, starting from the workplace. “We will focus on improving workplaces, by improving technologies and solutions to enable office individuals to work smarter,” he said.
To find out what else was said at the 2018 Ricoh Eco Action Day Industry Roundtable, watch the video report of the event here.
