USAID Assistant Administrator for Asia and the Near East, Margaret Carpenter, made a special presentation to the 200th US-AEP Environmental Technology Fund grantee on April 15 during the annual meeting of the National Association of State Development Agencies (NASDA). In November 1996, GeoSphere Emergency Response Systems, Inc. (Doylestown, Pennsylvania) was awarded the 200th grant by NASDA, which has implemented the Tech Fund since 1992. The grant is enabling GeoSphere to market its PlantSafe and TeleSafe emergency response advisory systems in Bangkok, Hong Kong, India, and Singapore. In her presentation, Carpenter noted that the private sector has to be part of the solution to sustainable development in Asia and that the Tech Fund successfully demonstrates how public and private sectors can work together. She recognized GeoSphere as a symbol of all the small-to-medium sized companies that the Tech Fund has helped and will help in the future.

Under US-AEP s NGO-Business Environmental Partnership program, the Korea Institute for Environment and Security (KIES) entered into partnership in 1996 with Pulmoune Company, one of the largest food manufacturing companies in Korea, to perform research and assist with implementation of water bottling alternatives. As part of the project, Park Joon-Woo, a senior researcher at KIES, visited recycling facilities in California in late 1996. The results of his findings on drinking water bottle recycling were then presented during a partnership-sponsored workshop on March 24, 1997. This initial NGO-Business activity, which also includes expanding glass recycling, is expected to lead to greater pollution prevention activities between the partners in the future.

Three Indonesian and Philippine delegates who attended the National Pollution Prevention Roundtable s spring convention through US-AEP s Environmental Exchange Program (see UPDATE, April 7, 1997), were later hosted by the town of Owantonna, Minnesota. Owantonna and its surrounding Steele County is one of the few examples of community-based sustainability in action in the United States, said Kevin McDonald of NPPR, who accompanied the international visitors. The visit demonstrated to the Asian guests how to design sustainable communities where businesses, industry, government, agriculture, and NGOs work together for a cleaner environment. NPPR, US-AEP s newest partner, is promoting the establishment of pollution prevention roundtables throughout Asia.

Under a grant from the State Environmental Initiative, a jointly sponsored US-AEP and Council of State Governments (CSG) program, the state of New Hampshire and Thailand have formed a public-private partnership to enhance cleaner production in Thailand s electroplating industry. Project Director, Ihab Farag reports that in February the partnership held two cleaner production workshops for more than 120 participants in joint cooperation with Thailand s National Science and Technology Development Agency (NSTDA) and the Industrial Estate Authority of Thailand. The partnership is also sponsoring an electroplating internship program for 12 students from the universities of Burapha, Chiang Mai, Chulalongkorn, and Kasetsart. The students will be hosted this summer by six local electroplating industries. A cleaner production training workshop for these interns was held March 18-21 at Chulalongkorn University in Bangkok and was funded by NSTDA.

In September 1995, Bio-Genesis Tech International LLC (Diamond Bar, California) visited four Asian countries under the auspices of US-AEP s Environmental Technology Fund. Since then, US-AEP s Technology Representatives and Environmental Technology Network for Asia (ETNA) have been assisting this Californian company in finding Asian distributors for its microbial absorbents and bacterial remediation products. US-AEP/Singapore arranged meetings with potential distributors in Singapore, and in March 1996, BioGenesis formed an exclusive partnership with National Scientific Pte. Ltd. In the same month, Bio-Genesis signed a distributorship agreement, worth $100,000 in the first year, with Fajar Saintifik Sdn Bhd. US- AEP/Malaysia played an instrumental role in this deal by providing market-specific information and counselling. Bio-Genesis now has exclusive distributors in Singapore, Malaysia, Thailand, Korea, Brunei, and the Philippines. All of these developments are directly related to the excellent, thorough, and professional assistance we received from the US-AEP and Department of Commerce people in these respective countries. Without their help we would not have had these successes, praised Bio-Genesis CEO, Robert Morriss.

Textile professionals from seven Asian countries met in Bandung, Indonesia, February 24-28,1997, to participate in a US-AEP-sponsored course, Environmental Management Systems (EMS) for the Textile Industries. The five-day course, organized by the Institute of International Education (IIE), offered participants an opportunity to learn through the presentation of case studies. Jack Wen Yen Tang, one of Levi Strauss Eximco s Asia Managers, shared his company s strategy for engaging its suppliers in environmentally sound practices. He remarked that by following Levi s assurance guidelines, suppliers are noticing more efficient operations, improved safety standards and worker relations, and increased productivity. Other participants included Grandtex (Indonesia), Fountain Set and Link Dyeing (Hong Kong), Far Eastern Eclat Textile Co. (Taiwan), Nanyang Textile Group (Thailand), and the Thai Textile Bleaching, Dyeing, Printing and Finishing Industries Association. This course was funded by US- AEP through it s Environmental Exchange Program and hosted by the Institute of Research and Development of the Textile Industry in Bandung. We d like to recognize Indonesia s Ministry of Industry and Trade (MoIT)as a sponsor of the regional textile course, as well as the participation by Zaenal Arifin, Director for the Textiles Industries at MoIT, who gave the opening welcome.