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Green Productivity Practices in Select Industry Sectors (Asia)

The Asian Productivity Organization has been conducting various activities related to the environment over the past ten years with a view to increasing environmental consciousness and promoting policy, technology and knowledge on the protection and improvement of the environment among its member countries. However, measures taken by factories and farms in the region are often not satisfactory for solving environmental problems in spite of ever-growing awareness on the issue. The reasons for this are probably because conventional waste treatment technologies tend to impose a net cost on industries and thus erode their competitiveness.
Inspired by the developments during 1992 such as the Earth Summit in Rio and the Agenda 21, the APO launched its Special Program for the Environment in 1994 under a special grant from the Japanese government. In an endeavor to find practical and attractive approaches for industries to deal with both productivity and environmental protection for sustainable development, the APO has decided to tackle the issue with the concept of Green Productivity (GP). In concrete terms, GP aims at instituting a better environment in the process of increasing productivity thus lending a competitive edge to the businesses in the age of globalization.
To substantiate the GP concept, the APO has adopted a multi-dimensional micro-to-macro approach to promote GP practices. It focuses on the enterprise level through the applications of productivity and management tools (such as TQM, 5S, TPM etc.) that are in tandem with waste and emission prevention, energy conservation, pollution control, and Environmental Management Systems (EMS). Initially taking off from the industrial sector, the GP is now being increasingly applied to agriculture, service industry and the even communities. GP is thus evolving as a drive with comprehensive strategies for sustainable socio-economic development.
Over the last several years, the APO has actively promoted the concept of Green Productivity throughout the region through the forms of demonstration projects, information dissemination, and promotional missions. APO has established partnerships with NPOs and various industrial development organizations around the region.
The APO initiated a research survey in late 1998 to study the state of GP implementation in Singapore, Malaysia, Taiwan, Thailand, the Philippines, and Japan. The specific research goals were to review the existing national efforts to promote GP and GP-related approaches; compile case studies of GP implementation in SMEs and analyze barriers to further adoption of GP practices; and provide recommendations on how to further develop GP in the region. Click on Green productivity in the blog roll for more infos.

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