Climate change and sustainability: there are billions of euro for green projects to tackle the challenges ahead

Sustainability is one of the most important trends of today’s business environment. The changes that companies need to make in order to meet the standards of ESG (Environment, Social and Governance) should be a concern for everyone, including the consumers. How can we make the changes was the main topic for the speakers in the opening panel of BR’s Environmental & Sustainability Summit 2022.

Ionut Georgescu Founder CEO Fepra Waste Division

Ionut Georgescu, Founder & CEO at Fepra Waste Division, pointed out that we all need to speak the same language when it comes to sustainability as this is the only way understand it’s importance.

“The consumers consider sustainability as a topic, but we should never forget how important sustainability is today. We should learn from our failures in the past 30 years, it is the best way to learn and to move forward. Each of us can make a difference in the world. As Wener Erhard said, ‘I welcome the unprecedented opportunity for us to work globally on that which concerns us all human beings. If not you, who? If not now, when? If not here, where?'” Ionut Georgescu added that there are EUR 400 billions available for funding green projects in Romania and hopes that SMEs will participate with their own projects.

Lara Tassan Zanin Head of EIB Group Office in Romania

Lara Tassan-Zanin, Head of the European Investment Bank in Romania, talked about how things changed over the last years, pointing out that in 2018, when she came to Romania, it was next to impossible to meet officials at private events like BR’s Environmental & Sustainability Summit. “But things have changed,” she said.

“In Romania we have one the biggest offices, with 40 experts in different fields that are able to find the projects able to receive the financing. EIB invests around EUR 1,5 billion every years. As a public bank, we are not driven by profit, so we are interested financing infrastructure projects. Our loans are the cheapest solutions after grants. We will use PNRR money in order to provide support to SMEs in digital and green projects; we are entrusted by the Romanian government to do that,” se added. “We will also inject liquidity in funds that are financing green projects and we will provide guarantees for the projects that are made under our supervision.”

Mihai Precup, State Secretary Ministry of Finance

Mihai Precup, State Secretary at the Ministry of Finance, explained that in order to develop the entire economy, public-private projects (PPP) are needed, so this is one of the main objectives of the Ministry. There is also a need to unlock big projects in the private sector.

“There are a lot of money that can be used for funding from EU, PNRR, EBRD, the capital market. But we have to be able to use the financing. So the government and the private sector should work together on projects capable to receive the funds,” said Mihai Precup, adding that even in the success sector like the IT&C, that grew to represent 6 percent of GDP, we still need digitalisation projects that can keep the sector growing every year.

Bogdan Balaniscu State Secretary Ministry of Environment

Bogdan Balaniscu, State Secretary at The Ministry of Environment, Water and Forests, explained that is also important to understand how we see Romania in 10, 20 and 30 years, and this is a challenge that we all have to face.

“It is important to find the path for our vision of Romania in 2050 and keep that path until we reach the goals we have. Today, we have a lot of money through PNRR for waste management projects and we should use those money. But there are still legal issues to solve. Even if we have projects that are already moving and producing, they need the legal framework in order to use the products,” said Bogdan Balaniscu. “The good news is that in the past year we managed to get a grip on climate challenges, a more dynamic approach on this issue.”

Alexandra Maria Bocse State Advisor Presidential Administration

Alexandra-Maria Bocse, State Adviser on Climate and Sustainability at Presidential Administration of Romania, also showed that we need a plan for 2050. President Klaus Iohannis launched recently a report fot tackling climate change, a report that is now under public debate.

“We hope that this report will help Romania to fight the challenges that are coming in all aspects of climate change, including nature changes. When it comes to climate changes like green-house gases we can see that Romania had decreased the emissions in the last 30 years. And this is very important because we saw how much the GDP per capita grew in the last three decades, meaning we can have economic growth while reducing pollution,” said Bocse. “Romania is also one of the biggest holders of biodiversity in Europe and we have this biodiversity because we were able to hold on the fauna and flora and not destroy them,” she added.

Violeta Nenita, Market Manager at IKEA Romania, explained that all the companies are going through big changes and big transformations. The pandemic, the climate, conflicts we see – all are reasons for the change.

“We have ambitious targets for 2030. One is connected to the business and we want to be a circular company by 2030. We want our customers to keep for longer the products we sell or to bring the products back when they decide to change the furniture. More than 60 percent of our products is made with recycled materials and we have a goal for 2030 to have all the plastic recycled. By 2025 we have an objective to have zero emissions in our company. Even if we are going through a crisis right now, we are on the way to achieve the goal,” said Violeta Nenita.

DMCA

PROTECTED