250mn kr plan to promote green technology exports

Latest economic stimulus package seeks to create jobs through investments in environmental technologies

The government today released a 250 million kroner plan it hopes will stimulate economic and job growth by promoting green technology exports.

The plan, drawn up by the Environment Ministry and the Business and Growth Ministry, aims to help Danish companies grab a larger slice of the growing international market for water, biological and environmental technologies.

“Denmark must be a pioneer and role model for new environmental technology. We must stimulate technological development and inspire the rest of the world to buy Danish,” the environment minister, Ida Auken (Socialistisk Folkeparti), said in a press release.

One of the ways that will be accomplished is by establishing so-called “green paths” that will showcase Danish businesses to foreign investors.

Even though the government's own panel of economic advisors, Det Økonomiske Råd, has warned against “choosing winners” by promoting one sector over another, the minister of business and growth, Annette Vilhelmsen (Socialistisk Folkeparti), argued that today's plan is purely based on potential for growth and export.

The government estimated in 2010 that about 53,000 people in Denmark were employed in companies that work with water, biological and environmental technology.

“That’s an area that we will strengthen considerably,” Vilhelmsen said in a press release. 

Another of the plan’s initiatives, so-called industrial symbiosis, will, according to Vilhelmsen, “put focus on how one company’s waste can be another company’s resource, which is good for the environment and for production”.

Fact File | Green growth

The green growth plan consists of 40 different initiatives spread out over five areas:

Water technology – Increased focus on water management and efficiency

Biological technologies – Efforts to promote a European market for biological technologies

Resource efficiency and waste – Encouraging manufacturers to be more resource-effective and promoting a more competitive and innovative waste treatment industry

Clean-air technology – Efforts to demonstrate technologies to improve air quality in urban areas

Other green initiatives – Funding for improved research and education, increased marketing and export as well as the promotion of investment into green technology

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