Pakistan Leads in Sustainability Commitment: 60% Willing to Take Pay Cut for Eco-Friendly Jobs, GSMA Study Finds

Pakistan, November 22 2023: A recent research conducted by GSMA Intelligence with support from Huawei, revealed that about 60% of survey respondents in Pakistan would accept a lower salary in order to work for an organization that had set a target to reduce its carbon emissions. That compares with about half of respondents, on average, in other countries surveyed. Companies that fail to embed climate change in their core business strategy risk damaging their reputation and also lose the opportunity to launch potentially profitable new lines of business.

Pakistan is working to decrease CO2 equivalent emissions. The government is pursuing strategies for combating climate change, including the promotion of renewables and electric vehicles, a ban on plastic bags, and the billion-tree plantation drive.

The research found that 80% of consumers surveyed across 16 countries now view climate change as the world’s No. 1 challenge. Moreover, it found that 60% of respondents consider climate or sustainability when buying a product, while 45% say they are willing to pay a premium for products and services that have been certified carbon neutral.

The inclination toward such “green purchasing” appeared to be greatest in countries that are most exposed to extreme weather conditions induced by climate change. The highest correlations are seen in the Philippines, Pakistan, Brazil, Türkiye, and Indonesia–fast-growing emerging economies with direct exposure to warming and extreme weather events. Consumers in such countries indicated an above-average willingness to change their behavior in response to climate change.

“There is a latent ‘green premium’ available for telecom operators if sustainability criteria can be embedded into product design and marketing,” said Tim Hatt, head of research and consulting at GSMA Intelligence. “Consumers want to align with green brands and will pay for assured credentials on the products they buy, and there is a first-mover advantage still out there for companies to meet this demand.”

From an industry perspective, Tim Hatt of GSMA Intelligence stated that, “For operators, selling 5G and other technologies to enterprise verticals offers both productivity gains and higher power efficiency,” said. “The latter has historically been underappreciated but is now center stage; any company on a 2050 net-zero timeline will have to cut CO2 emissions by 50% in each successive decade.

“When it comes to investing, sustainability is no longer considered a niche,” said David Trevitt, a digital transformation advisor at Huawei, which funded the GSMA Intelligence research.

Trevitt recently addressed the topic of sustainability and corporate reputation in the Huawei’s thought leadership magazine, Transform.

“Climate response is an ethical issue that is becoming an increasingly important part of reputation management for many enterprises. To avoid reputational damage, organizations must embed their climate response in their business strategy.”

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