Green office movement aims at sustainable development goals’ implementation
“Whether in the industry, the service sphere or business, creating green offices is a good trend. Back in 2013, our country took a course towards a green economy. It is very important to engage people in its realization”, Saltanat Rakhimbekova, Chairwoman of the Coalition for Green Economy and G-Global Development, said while talking about the Green Offices movement.
She expressed a hope that such a movement will be a good message for all large industries of the country in oil and gas, coal industries, and so on.
Aigul Solovyova, leader of the environmental movement, Board Chairwoman of Kazakhstan’s Environmental Organizations Association, told that the key topics relating to green office would be on the table as well as a memorandum on cooperation would be concluded, which is, according to her, is a prime example that the society has matured.
“It [green office – author’s note] is not just a trend, it is largely aimed at human capital and the potential of its development. As I understand it, green offices are when the conditions are created that are described in our strategic documents, the sustainable development goals, emission and greenhouse reduction, decrease in a burden on the environment, resource conservation, energy-efficiency, environmental mechanisms, and most importantly it is aimed at people, as the person who works in such an office, he travels back home in good health”, she said.
According to her, an environmental code is being designed together with the Ministry of Energy of Kazakhstan.
The OSCE Programme Office in Nur-Sultan is one of the international organizations that has been supporting green initiatives, environmental projects for several years now in a systematic way.
“Back in 1972, the UN Conference adopted the declaration consisting of 26 principles that every organization should follow in terms of environment protection as well as rationally use natural resources. The Declaration declared that the protection and recovery of the environment is a primary task of humanity”, Diana Digol, Deputy Head of the OSCE Programme Office in Nur-Sultan, said.
According to her, the transnational companies actively extracting oil particularly threaten Kazakhstan’s environment.
“It is not about their commercial interests over environmental ones, the thing is that the oil contamination and industrial corporations have a huge potential to cause harm to the environment”, she said.
According to her, environmental projects positively affect any company, attract attention of consumers who take care of the environment. She called on environmentally responsible companies to the green office contest.
Daniyar Rakhmatullayev, Deputy Chairman of ERG’s (Eurasian Group) Finance Board, underlined that the company’s one of the corporate values is responsibility. According to him, the company holds responsibility to each employee, their families, clients, and Earth after all.
“We operate in five regions of Kazakhstan, four continents. We work not only in Kazakhstan but also in Africa, Brazil, Europe. Bigger you are, bigger your responsibilities. Therefore, we spend a lot of time and funds to ensure environmental sustainability”, he said.
The company switches to electronic correspondence, moving away from using papers. It also has many initiatives in pursuit of the green office movement. Daniyar Rakhmatullayev called on other companies to support the movement, and expressed hope to see many companies joining the green office movement.
The roundtable titled “Green Offices – on the road towards the 2030 sustainable development goals” devoted to World Environment Day took place on 4 June 2019 in Nur-Sultan. It was held by the Coalition for Green Economy and G-Global Development and supported by the Kazakh Ministry of Energy, ERG, the OCSE Programme Office in Nur-Sultan.
Adlet Seilkhanov
