Eco-Industrial Park (EIP) Development in Viet Nam: Results and Key Insights from UNIDO’s EIP Project (2014–2019)

Abstract

Industrial parks have been promoted as cornerstone strategies for economic development in countries around the world, including Viet Nam. The transformation of conventional industrial zones (IZs) into eco-industrial parks (EIPs) presents an effective opportunity to attain inclusive and sustainable industrial development, as well as increasing the economic competitiveness and resilience of industrial parks. This paper presents and discusses the interventions, key results, and lessons learned from the Ministry of Planning and Investment (MPI) and UNIDO’s work on EIPs in Viet Nam as part of the Project “Implementation of eco-industrial park initiative for sustainable industrial zones in Viet Nam”. The Project was undertaken with the objective of developing policies and guidelines to facilitate the transformation of industrial zones into eco-industrial parks and implementing EIP principles in five existing industrial zones in the provinces of Da Nang (Hoa Khanh IZ), Can Tho (Tra Noc 1 and 2 IZs), and Ninh Binh (Khanh Phu IZ and Gian Khau IZ), which serve as pilots to support replication and upscaling across Viet Nam. The application of the Project’s policy, company, and park-level interventions demonstrated their value in contributing to the development and implementation of EIP practices in the country. Rather than stand-alone solutions, multi-disciplinary EIP concepts are most effective if applied as part of an integrated top-down approach (policy support as entry point for interventions) combined with a bottom-up approach (industrial park as entry point). The issuance of Decree 82/2018/ND-CP on the management of industrial parks and economic zones is a new policy outlining the requirements and process for transforming industrial zones into EIPs. The Decree is thereby an important driver for EIP development. Legal challenges with regards to EIPs still exist, including the lack of available and reliable data and the need for detailed standards and guidelines on reusing by-products, wastes, and wastewater. The final adoption of minimum EIP requirements in Viet Nam for social, economic, and environmental aspects is a key issue for scaling up implementation. The work undertaken as part of the Project will continue through the Global EIP Programme, in which Viet Nam is one of the participating countries.

Decarbonization of Vietnam’s economy: decomposing the drivers for a low-carbon growth

“…This development has resulted in the rising consumption of fossil fuel resources especially by the export-oriented industries, and complemented by services and commercial activities (Van and Sam 2008). More recently, governmental efforts on transforming industrial parks into eco-industrial parks have also been reported (Stucki et al 2019). Nonetheless, the results highlight that increasing reliance on fossil resources has been largely responsible for much of the carbon emissions, and its impact share may continue to grow unless adequate policy interventions are implemented.…”

“…This is reflected by the lower impact of the technological factors on CO 2 emissions even after decades of industrial development in the country. Thus, sustainable industrial policies to promote eco-industrial development could also help mitigate industrial CO 2 emissions (Stucki et al 2019;Van Nguyen and Le 2020;Shah et al 2020a).…”

“…From an emission intensity perspective, policies such as promoting industry-level cleaner production technologies, improving inefficient energy infrastructures, energy recovery of industrial waste in the form of industrial symbiosis (e.g., waste steam or excess heat networking), and increasing resource circularity in industrial ecosystems could produce good results (Stucki et al 2019).…”

Assessment of Eco-industrial Park (EIP) Performance at the Preliminary Step in Vietnam

“…Therefore, UNIDO has run EIP programs in various countries including Thailand, India, Morocco [11], and South Africa [12]. Especially, an EIP national project has been implemented in Vietnam, funded by the Global Environment Facility (GEF) and the State Secretariat for Economic Affairs of Switzerland (SECO) [13].…”

“…When it comes to resource, environmental, and savings metrics, knowledge of Vietnam's EIP performance has been limited by the analyses [10,13]. These investigations have lacked consideration and assessment based on mathematical methods, resulting in unsystematic and disconnected outcomes [16,17].…”