Advancing Green Industrialization in the Global South: Lessons from South and Southeast Asia

This panel examines how developing countries can advance green industrialization. Drawing on experiences from South and Southeast Asia, the discussion will explore what it takes to build greener and more competitive industries while ensuring that the transition is environmentally responsible and socially just. The session connects regional lessons on industrial decarbonization and clean commodity value chains with experiences from Indonesia’s critical mineral industry and Bangladesh’s garment industry. It focuses on how developing countries can finance low-carbon investment and industrial upgrading, how global ESG expectations can be translated into national regulatory frameworks and implementation, and how technology and markets can support greener industrial value chains. The session also considers how these changes affect workers and communities and how the costs and benefits of industrial transformation can be shared more equitably.

Green industrialization requires these elements to work together. Finance alone cannot deliver industrial transformation without effective policies, infrastructure, markets, and safeguards. At the same time, industrial decarbonization cannot be considered successful if it creates environmental and social costs or leaves workers and communities behind. By bringing these dimensions together, the session explores how developing countries can decarbonize existing industries, build competitive green industries, move up the value chain, and capture a greater share of the economic and social benefits of the transition.