SEOUL, South Korea, May 28, 2018 /PRNewswire/ -- SK Innovation (CEO and President Kim Jun, www.skinnovation.com) starts off its mangrove restoration project in Vietnam to tackle the global warming. The mangrove forest is dubbed as the "green lungs" of Asia.
SK Innovation announced that it signed a Memorandum of Understanding with the Vietnamese government and the United Nations Environment Program (UNEP) on May 24th to restore the mangrove forest. On the same day, its community activities of planting mangrove saplings took off.
The signing ceremony of the MOU was held at the office of the Tra Vinh's My Long Nam Commune People's Committee. The signing ceremony was attended by Nguyen Van Dai, Chairman of the Tra Vinh's My Long Nam Commune People's Committee, Pham Minh Truyen, Deputy Director of the Tra Vinh Department of Agriculture and Rural Development, and Jae Bum Kim, Secretary General of the Korea Association for UN Environment.
Nguyen Van Hung, Manager of Saigon Newport Corporation, Dong-soo Choi, President of SK Innovation's Exploration and Production Business, also took part in the ceremony.
Based on the agreement, SK Innovation will join forces with the Vietnamese government and UNEP to build 5 hectare areas of mangrove forest in Tra Vinh at its 1st stage, planting 15,000 mangrove saplings by the end of September.
At its earliest stage of the restoration project, about 100 people including 20 employees from SK Innovation, local residents and government officers will plant the saplings. On the heels of the event, SK Innovation will be engaged with the local community by delivering stationaries and soccer balls to children in the neighborhood.
SK Innovation's spokesperson said, "SK Innovation's mangrove restoration has been welcomed by the Vietnamese government and the local governments, not to mention the local community. SK Innovation will continue its efforts to fight against global warming and to create social values."
SK Innovation has been working on two exploration blocks including the Block 15-1 in Vietnam. Last April, SK Energy, a petroleum subsidiary of SK Innovation, sealed a deal with SNP, a leading state logistics and shipping company in Vietnam, to set up a joint venture company named SNP-SK energy to build service areas for HGV and truck drivers. SK Innovation plans to expand into various other businesses by taking Vietnam as its major base for its Southeast Asian business development.
In the meantime, since 1996 SK Group has been offering voluntary pediatric reconstructive surgeries for children with facial deformities in Vietnam. A total of 3,800 children have benefited from SK Group's 22 rounds of voluntary activities. And this year SK Group plans to support reconstructive surgeries for about 200 Vietnamese children with the deformities for a week starting from the end of June.