Switzer­land-In­done­sia: Co­op­er­a­tion within the Trade and Sus­tain­abil­ity Coun­cil takes con­crete shape

Last May, economiesu­isse and the In­done­sian Cham­ber of Com­merce and In­dus­try KADIN launched the Swiss-In­done­sian Trade and Sus­tain­abil­ity Coun­cil ("Coun­cil"). With it, an im­por­tant forum in the bi­lat­eral re­la­tion­ship that fa­cil­i­tates cross-sec­toral ex­change on sus­tain­abil­ity pro­jects in the pri­vate sec­tor has been cre­ated. About eight months after the launch of the Coun­cil, its mem­ber or­gan­i­sa­tions met last Fri­day for the Sec­ond An­nual Meet­ing.

Pri­vate sec­tor as a key dri­ver of sus­tain­abil­ity

A total of around 30 high-rank­ing rep­re­sen­ta­tives from busi­ness, pol­i­tics and ad­min­is­tra­tion took part in the event on site or vir­tu­ally. On the Swiss side, top rep­re­sen­ta­tives from Swiss Tex­tiles, Swiss­mem, Swiss­con­tact and Switzer­land Global En­tre­prise (S-GE) were pre­sent along­side economiesu­isse Chair­man Christoph Mäder. On the In­done­sian side, var­i­ous rep­re­sen­ta­tives of KADIN as well as the In­done­sian Min­is­ter for Co­op­er­a­tives and SMEs, Teten Mas­duki and the Vice-Min­is­ter for Tourism, Rizki Han­dayani took part. Fi­nally, the am­bas­sadors of both coun­tries, Olivier Zehn­der and Mu­lia­man Hadad, at­tended the event and ex­pressed their full sup­port for the Coun­cil.

The Coun­cil was founded with the firm con­vic­tion that the pri­vate sec­tor has a cen­tral role to play in the im­ple­men­ta­tion of sus­tain­abil­ity pro­jects. Mr Mäder re­minded the au­di­ence of this in his open­ing speech, point­ing out the three di­men­sions of sus­tain­abil­ity – so­cial, eco­log­i­cal and eco­nomic. Now it is a mat­ter of im­ple­ment­ing these pro­jects in con­crete terms.

Pro­jects in four focus areas

With the adop­tion of an am­bi­tious work­ing agenda, the Coun­cil has al­ready started this im­ple­men­ta­tion last year. Tex­tiles, ed­u­ca­tion and train­ing, nat­ural in­gre­di­ents in food pro­duc­tion and green in­fra­struc­ture – it is within these four focus areas that the fu­ture work of the Coun­cil will be em­bed­ded. While in the tex­tile sec­tor, biodegrad­able ma­te­r­ial and the use of or­ganic col­orants are among the most im­por­tant top­ics, so­lu­tions are being sought in the ed­u­ca­tion sec­tor on how In­done­sian vo­ca­tional schools can im­prove their co­op­er­a­tion with the pri­vate sec­tor. The ex­change of pro­fes­sion­als from both coun­tries is also to be in­ten­si­fied. Fi­nally, in the in­fra­struc­ture sec­tor, sus­tain­abil­ity pro­jects in waste man­age­ment and steel pro­duc­tion are on the agenda. Pos­si­ble syn­er­gies be­tween the Swiss and In­done­sian pri­vate sec­tors are also being ex­plored in the area of local pub­lic trans­port.