Dr Elizabeth Yi Wang in the 7th World Investment Forum, UN Conference on Trade and Development

Does Green Policy Bring About Global Green Innovation?: An Analysis of Green Patents of Foreign Subsidiaries and Host Environmental Policy Stringency

During the Aligning Multinational Firms For The “Decade of Action” panel discussion, Dr Wang discussed this in-depth study on the impact of environmental policy on green innovation and reported the findings of the effectiveness of green policies in inducing green innovation by foreign entities. Specifically, host country’s market-based environmental policies have been the driving force of green patent outputs of overseas subsidiaries of multinational enterprises (MNEs).

Dr Wang’s talk further emphasised the importance of focusing on the local implementation of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), by introducing innovation in environmental policy instruments that can help to develop local and global markets for green technologies. She suggested that ways to enable the alignment of MNEs for the decades of action requires actions to revise risk expectations about green investments. These actions include a better communication of stakeholder priorities between host governments and MNEs in terms of sustainable development, the expansion of local green markets, and co-development of high-value adding local green assets through partnerships.