In this era of Covid-19 pandemic and climate change, through the Sustainable Development Goals, countries are making commitments on sustainability for the planet to be continually liveable for the years to come. In the 4th Sustainability Summit held on 22 November, a gathering of CEOs was organized where they gave their vision, their ideas, their action, practices and perspectives on how their companies extend help to micro, small and medium enterprises in aiming more sustainable practices. In the same Summit, Mr. Gustavo Gonzales, UN Philippine Resident Coordinator shared that the deadline of the SDGs is in 8 years but the pandemic brought a slight regression in SDG accomplishments. To rescue this, adequate financing is needed through an established diversified framework. The framework would have to establish greater integration for stakeholder in finance and synergy across the public and private sectors.
To know the vision, plans and actions being done by businesses, the Summit’s CEO Forum entitled, From Case Studies to Scaling-Up for Success and Impact , CEOs and COOs of participant companies , namely Mr. Cezar P. Consing, President & CEO, Ayala Corporation, Ms. Anna Lagon, Co-CEO and Chief Creative Officer, Bayo Manila, Inc., Mr. David Sutherland, Chair of the Board, International Care Ministries, Mr. Jesus C. Romero, Chief Operating Officer, Converge ICT Solutions, Inc., Mr. Jose Ma. K. Lim, Former CEO, Executive Adviser & Board Member, Metro Pacific Investments Corporation, Mr. Kais Marzouki, Chairman and CEO, Nestlé PH, and Ms. Karen Ong, CEO, Prestige Quality Paper Products Corporation shared their thoughts, vision, and experiences on their sustainability journeys and how their businesses provide support to MSMEs.
Here are the 10 things that companies do to help MSMEs recover from the consequences of the pandemic and to attain resiliency and sustainability
- Support for MSME recovery involved stakeholders, the community, MSMEs themselves and infrastructure. It spans from providing livelihood for communities from BAYO, equipment for stakeholders from Prestige Papers. Most support from large companies such as MPIC and Converge give support to LGUs especially in times of disaster particularly in providing water and electricity and internet respectively. At the same time, recruit local businesses to do the installation of services and extend deadline of payments for customers. Nestle emphasized on shared value across value chains ensuring growth among value chain players.
- Government partnership with the private sector is the main solution to de-risk MSMEs. According to the business leaders, this partnership would entail disclosure of suppliers and transparency in transactions. There are challenges in decentralization because the private sector had to deal with different standards and rules when giving service.
- Two programs that can help are investing in small savings group to help MSMEs, and even the poor in creating savings; and food security where making farmers into entrepreneurs can be explored for the next generation of farmers.
- Companies continue the new normal among MSMEs by providing affordable internet services, power and water in underserved areas, according to ICM. MPIC confirmed that planning is very important and ensure that reservoirs are placed in far-flung areas.
- Sustainable packaging had demand during the pandemic. Companies are shifting to digital and paper free option and from plastic to recyclable packaging. Pineapple fiber for example, are converted to paper as a packaging material. Big manufacturing companies such as Nestle is shifting from plastic packaging to recyclable packaging. At the same time, they retrieve plastics from oceans to convert to cement. Prestige Paper Products provide sustainable packaging such as rock paper which is 80% calcium carbonate and 20% plastic; this is UV degradable.
- Companies track the progress of their sustainability through committees and councils including the environment, social, and governance scoring. There committees or councils report to the board officials. Nestle and Ayala Corporation aims to attain the goal of Net Zero by 2050. To attain this, they also needed to work with government regulators and agencies.
- To help MSMEs to become more resilient, connection with community and involving them in their value chain is the solution. Educating the community on conservation and provision of free education are also the services being done to help MSMEs and underserved areas be resilient from shocks and disasters.
- Government can support sustainability in business and MSMEs through improvement of policies, access to information and lower costs for MSMEs. It is also recommended to level the playing field and assure that there is no place for inefficiencies such as corruption and smuggling.
- Harmonizing policies among regulators and among LGUs such as collection of payments or money electronically should be established. Polices on the shift to renewable energies would have to be clear as well. Defining parameters on which projects are eligible under the public-private agreement can also help infrastructure companies deliver their business projects better.
- Planning ahead such as developing road maps for market expansion and addressing drivers of success are keys for a successful government and private sector partnership.