Mr. Nguyen Tien Quang, Director of VCCI Branch in Da Nang  
Representatives of Enterprises and business Associations;
Representatives of the Press;
Ladies and gentlemen,

It is my honor to welcome you to the workshop today, devoted to promoting a business network in Central Region to proactively respond to disasters, climate change together with our partners from the Viet Nam Chamber of Commerce and Industry (VCCI) and Viet Nam Disaster Management Authority (VNDMA).

At the outset, we would like to express our deep appreciation to VCCI and VNDMA for joint work with the private sector through our tripartite Technical Working Group. We strongly believe that our cooperation will fully develop into an effective Partnership in the years to come.

As a first step, in today’s workshop we would like to share our work results in 2022, and secondly to discuss how we can work together with a new business network in Central Region to better engage enterprises, business associations and chambers of commerce in actively participating to respond to disasters, climate change.

We all know that Viet Nam is one of the world’s most vulnerable countries to the effects of climate change and natural hazards. And we understand that the most popular and devastating hazards in Central Region are floods and storms. Just in October 2022, we witnessed three typhoons and large-scale flooding that caused 1.500 billion VND.

Against this backdrop, the private sector in Viet Nam is actively adapting to disasters and climate crisis. There are concrete examples that show the huge potential of the private sector to contribute to the national actions aiming to tackle disasters and climate crisis. For example:  

• The “V-rain” has become an innovative solution in rain gauging stations, analyzing rainfall and supporting authorities to enhance rain forecasts.
• Vietnamese companies have produced plastic water ponds used for storing freshwater in the Mekong delta in the fight against prolonged droughts.
• Thanks to innovative contributions of the businesses, public and private infrastructure is more resilient against impacts of storms, typhoons and floods.

In climate change adaptation, Vietnamese enterprises have also shown examples of green growth models, including investing in renewable energy, reducing raw material inputs, applying digital solutions to increase productivity. Enterprises research and develop seeds that are tolerant to climate extremes. Enterprises apply high-tech in agriculture sector to adapt to climate change.

Establishing a network of businesses in the Central Region will aim at promoting stronger engagement of enterprises and business associations to address disasters and climate change. In this connection, we would like to share key points moving forward:  

1. Resilience building is most effective when we work together with the private sector:  Businesses and the private sector play an important role in building resilience against floods and storms, and this is why UNDP is partnering with VCCI and VNDMA to set up this business network in the Central Region;    
2. The Network should function as a learning hub in order to document knowledge and good practices, share information with their members, including SMEs, on preparedness, business continuity and risk planning, response to disasters and climate emergencies;
3. It is important that the workplan of the Network stays open for 2023: we’d encourage the Technical Working Group and the Network Secretariat to organize seminars and meetings with ministries, foreign chambers of commerce and industries, business associations to explore new initiatives and innovative suggestion.

And finally, I would like to highlight that we are here to collaborate and help your network members enhance resilience against these shocks: If you need disaster awareness, knowledge and digital tools, contingency planning or corporate management trainings, we will stand by and provide our support.  
Ladies and gentlemen,

Building on our collaboration from the previous years, UNDP looks forward to continually strengthening our strategic partnership with VCCI and VNDMA to move ahead in assisting the Central Region network in order to promote effective engagement of the private sector in responding to disasters and climate change.

We stand ready to provide further support to enterprises to strengthen their capacity and business continuity planning, and to catalyze direct exchanges and collaboration between this Network in Viet Nam and networks managed by the global CBi project in other countries.

We are confident that working together, your joint workplan for 2023 will be helpful for the private sector in this hotspot of the country, which will then contribute to a resilient Viet Nam, where no one is left behind.    

Thank you. Xin Cam On!