Green Economy, Sustainability

Summary Report on the event of GGGW2019

Nov 15 2019 - It has been a great experience for me to attend the Global Green Growth Week (GGGW) 2019 hosted by the Global Green Growth Institute (GGGI), a treaty-based international, inter-governmental organization dedicated to supporting and promoting strong, inclusive, and sustainable economic growth. Through this year’s event, I had the opportunity to learn more about green growth and listen to diverse opinions from policymakers, researchers, environmental experts, and representatives of the private sector from all over the world. Even though I had attended only two days of the one week event, I gained valuable knowledge from many interesting seminars and informative specialized sessions on topics regarding green growth and renewable energy,. I realized the importance of GGGI as a leading institute to implement a new development paradigm on a model of economic growth that is both environmentally sustainable and socially inclusive.

For those of you who are unfamiliar with the event, GGGW2019 is GGGI’s flagship conference to accelerate and scale-up the transition toward renewable energy in support of achieving the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and Nationally Determined Contributions to the Paris Agreement. This year was the 3rd instance event under the banner of “Unlocking Renewable Energy Potential” and it was held in InterContinental Seoul COEX from Oct. 21 – 25.

On October 21, GGGW2019 began with the welcoming and opening remarks by the Director-General of GGGI, Dr. Frank Rijsberman, and the President and Chair, Mr. Ban Ki-moon. In his recorded address, President and Chair Ban Ki-moon emphasized the importance of the green energy transformation. He stated that it is important for the international community to adopt resolute measures to transform fossil fuel-based energy systems. He added that, “This transition towards renewable energy sources is not only about challenges. It presents new opportunities to modernize our energy systems, accelerate and diversify their economies, create green jobs, increase productivity and competitiveness and reduce poverty.”

After the opening remarks and keynote, there was a high-level panel moderated under GGGI Director-General, Frank Rijsberman. The panelists discussed the key approaches used in countries to support new clean energy systems and infrastructure as well as country experiences and their perspectives on approaches in achieving national economic growth and energy security objectives.

In the afternoon, I attended the Parallel Session: Integrated Approaches to Clean Energy Infrastructure (GGKP Partner Presentations), during which panelists discussed to what extent energy infrastructure is significant for achieving the SDGs and how integrated approaches could be practiced to accelerate the action for the social, environmental, and economic aspects of sustainability. The speakers emphasized the role of the government to optimize the outcome by implementing policy and imposing subsidy.

GGGW2019 also offered the platform for the announcement of many new milestones for GGGI; the launch of GGGI’s Green Growth Index, the adoption of the GGGI Strategy 2030, and the announcement of Mr. Ban Ki-moon’s re-election as GGGI Assembly President and Council Chair were momentous proceedings of the event.

The Green Growth Index is the first benchmarked composite index designed to track and assess the performance of green growth based on efficient use of sustainable resources, natural capital protection, green economic opportunities, and social inclusion. Through this launch event, I could learn how the new index can be used to measure countries’ green growth performance and what the index means regarding their current green growth progress. Even though, at the regional level, some countries scored moderate in the index, considerable efforts are still needed to improve the performance at a global level. As a student majoring in Economics, I realized that there is a correlation between the environment and the country’s economy. It was interesting to observe how the concepts and theories that I learned in class were applied in the real-world situation to make the world a greener place.

I would like to express my sincere thanks to people who made the GGGW2019 possible and those who shared their experiences, knowledges, and perspectives during this event.

To learn more about GGGI, please visit gggi.org