Stakeholders perspectives

Businesses

At the end of the 1980s, there has been a shift of emphasis from a “top-down” approach towards self-regulation by the industries through various incentive schemes. The traditional approach, although proven useful, has become increasingly costly to both government and industry.

Mr Olle Blidholm, H&M’s environmental sustainability manager, says that, from a business perspective, it makes sense to take care of social and environmental issues. “To do good business long term, you need to take into account social and environmental responsibility in a more active way. You have to plan your business in line with what the planet can cope with,” he says.

Establishing a green reputation also which helps to build loyalty among the millennials of tomorrow as shoppers are becoming more aware about sustainability and being socially responsible.

Government

The increase in waste generation is a noted challenge for Singapore, an island city-state with an area of only 704 square kilometres and a population of 4.59 million people. To remain attractive, it is essential for Singapore to maintain a good quality living environment, where standards of public health meet the growing expectations of our local population as well as those of investors, tourists and a highly mobile international and local talent pool of people.

At the same time, there was international consensus on the need to take action on global environmental issues, such as global warming, the protection of the ozone layer, and the preservation of wildlife and prevention of coastal pollution, in which Singapore was an active participant and advocate.

The problem of increasing solid waste is compounded by Singapore’s warm and humid climate, which makes refuse extremely putrefiable. Refuse has to be removed and disposed of quickly, efficiently and safely before it gives rise to smell nuisance, infectious diseases and other public health hazards. Furthermore, if the rate of waste disposal were to continue to grow as it did, scarce land resources would need to be set aside to build more expensive incinerators and landfills. This was clearly not sustainable.

The state has played the major role in keeping recycling standards in Singapore as much as possible. Singapore had developed its own integrated approach to ensuring that industrial development was not at the expense of the living environment. Singapore has impressive public waste-management systems. It recycles about 60 percent of its solid waste and incinerates 38 percent of its total waste in waste-to-energy plants despite deteriorating recycling efforts by households.

  • Investments in waste collection and treatment infrastructure are made in tandem with industrial and urban developments to minimise pollution to our land and waters. In 2015, the island state launched a blueprint with targets for a more sustainable Singapore which includes new measures to encourage household recycling such as dual chutes for waste and recycling in new public housing blocks.
  • Judicious legislation is enacted to control pollution. This is complemented by close monitoring of ambient air, inland and coastal waters to assess the adequacy and effectiveness of the environmental pollution control programmes and by strict enforcement to ensure that waste collection and treatment facilities are properly operated and maintained, and the standards and requirements complied with.
  • Education programmes are conducted to educate the public on the protection of the environment.

Consumers

According to a 2015 global report by research firm Nielsen, 72 per cent of Generation Z consumers – those aged between 15 and 20 – were willing to pay more for products and services from companies they viewed as committed to making a positive social and environmental impact. This is up from 55 per cent the year before.

Shoppers care more than just about how they look. They want to be part of a larger movement and they care about the social responsibility behind the brands they buy, says Singapore Polytechnic senior retail lecturer Sarah Lim.

The thing is, a lot of people have the intention to do good and recycle, but when it becomes troublesome to do so, they don’t do it in the end. “The lack of awareness and indifference only partly explains the absence of recycling habits [in Singapore] … In most cases people do not recycle simply because they are not required to do so,” said Tong Yen Wah, co-director of the Energy and Environmental Sustainability Solutions for Megacities program at the NUS Environmental Research Institute.

Lack of social regulation

Lynn Su-Lin, a recycling advocate and environmentalist, told CNBC the reason she believed recycling hadn’t caught on in Singapore was because of “the lack of social consciousness in thousands of Singaporean families.”

Shared values and common interests

While sustainabiilty can be integrated into business strategies and most organisations already claim to do this, in practice, societal issues tend to be sidelined in a business strategy when businesses compete for profits.

  • Shareholder returns are prioritised over everything else;
  • We do not sufficiently value the natural and human resources on which these returns depend; and
  • Our discount rate is too high: we value the short-term more than the future.

Nonetheless, aware of how sustainability adds value to their business growth, businesses should try to strike a balance between business strategies and social consciousness. Overall, individuals, governments and industries share a common interest to protect the environment for sustainable, livable and fulfilling lives.