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A combination of a delicate natural environment and increasing poverty is encouraging the son of a billionaire business founder to improve their company’s sustainable and social efforts.

Property group Alliance Global is based in the Philippines, which — being an archipelago of more than 7,000 islands — is particularly susceptible to the effects of climate change, as CEO Kevin Tan described.

“We’re located in a very unique and rather precarious geographic location,” Tan said. “Every year, we experience several calamities, ranging from simple tropical depressions to typhoons to even prolonged droughts and dry spells … In recent years, we have actually seen these occurrences happen more frequently, and with a much higher ferocity,” he added.

Founded by Tan’s father Andrew Tan in 1993, Alliance Global operates in real estate, hospitality and food, with assets including casino and hotel complex Resorts World Manila, and the world’s largest brandy distiller, Emperador. It is also the main McDonald’s franchise holder in the Philippines, via its Golden Arches Development Corporation.

Alongside this, the country has a poverty problem: The World Bank estimates that there will have been 2 million more poor Filipinos in 2020 than there were in 2018 due to the coronavirus pandemic, per a June report — the country has a total population of 108 million.

And according to Tan, a shifting population is also putting pressure on resources. “(There is an) uneven sort of distribution of population growth towards the urban centers versus the rural centers of our country. And … it poses several challenges — among them is really this unequal distribution of economic opportunities,” he said.

The Philippines’ environmental and economic issues spurred Alliance Global to identify two goals: becoming carbon neutral by 2035 and creating 5 million jobs, either directly or indirectly, by the same date. “We decided we wanted to be … better corporate citizens,” Tan said. However, the pandemic meant that the firm extended its deadline for both from 2030. “Nothing could have prepared us for this. I have to admit, yes, of course we had to step back a bit, because we were on survivor mode for the most part of last year and even until today, we’ve had to recalibrate our entire business model. We’ve had to … reduce our costs,” Tan explained.

Alliance Global’s Emperador is the world’s largest brandy distiller.
Jay Directo | AFP | Getty Images

The firm’s net income reduced by 62% year-over-year to 10.3 billion pesos ($216 million) in 2020, although several of its businesses recovered during the fourth quarter. McDonald’s revenue went up 36% compared with the previous quarter, while liquor sales at Emperador rose 42% over the same period.

Making its alcohol operations more environmentally-friendly has been a focus for Alliance Global: At Emperador the firm uses biogas created from the distilling process to fuel its boilers. In turn, the boilers produce steam, which powers turbines and creates electricity. Around 30% of the company’s distillery operations are powered this way, while vineyards producing grapes for its Fundador brandy in Spain use a process called deficit irrigation, where only the areas that need water are given it.

When it comes to economic development, Tan said the company’s Megaworld “township” residential and office complexes are creating jobs. He singled out Iloilo, a development on the Philippines’ Panay Island, where there is a focus on business process outsourcing (BPO), a practice where firms contract some of their operations to external suppliers. Such BPO companies are growing — and they need office space, Tan said. “Traditionally, the BPO sector was dominated by health care, travel, and financial services. Because of the pandemic, new industries have been introduced to outsourcing, for example logistics, technology, and e-commerce,” he explained.

Alliance Global is also looking to reduce waste in its developments. “We collect all the plastics from all of our developments, from all of our communities, we put them together and … cement factories, they take this plastic and use it as fuel,” Tan said.

Tan claimed the firm now looks at a “triple” bottom line. “Profitability is obviously still very important … But when we look at things now, we look at … not just having a singular bottom line, but having a triple bottom line, and that now includes, of course, environmental sustainability, as well as our social impact.”

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U.S. ambassador insists America remains the top foreign policy actor in the Middle East

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U.S. ambassador insists America remains the top foreign policy actor in the Middle East

America is the most important foreign policy actor in the region, U.S. Ambassador to the UAE says

The U.S. Ambassador to the United Arab Emirates Martina Strong believes the U.S. is unequivocally the most important foreign policy actor in the Middle East.

Her comments come roughly one year after President Joe Biden threatened “consequences” for Saudi Arabia after the OPEC kingpin slashed oil production along with its allies against Washington’s wishes.

Biden’s administration has been notably quiet about recent OPEC+ output cuts, however, even as oil prices have rallied close to $100 a barrel.

The U.S. is seeking to orchestrate a delicate balancing act in the region, particularly as it pushes for the normalization of ties between Israel and Saudi Arabia and responds to China’s growing influence.

Saudi Arabia has recently shown signs of steering toward China and Russia after rekindling relations with Iran through Beijing-mediated talks and receiving an invitation to join the emerging economies’ BRICS alliance.

Asked by CNBC’s Dan Murphy whether the U.S. remained the most important foreign policy actor in the region, Strong replied, “Absolutely. I have no doubt about it. Our leadership is really unquestioned and apparent in every, I would say, region of the world — and this is no different.”

Strong said the U.S. is “working very closely together with the UAE and with our other partners here in the region on our core national security priorities as well as our national economic priorities.”

Saudi Arabia’s Crown Prince and Prime Minister Mohammed bin Salman (L), India’s Prime Minister Narendra Modi (C) and U.S. President Joe Biden attend a session as part of the G20 Leaders’ Summit at the Bharat Mandapam in New Delhi on September 9, 2023.

Evelyn Hockstein | Afp | Getty Images

“When it comes to security, President Biden has put forward a very positive, strong vision for our cooperation with the region. It’s based on diplomacy, it’s based on deterrence, de-escalation and, at the end of all this, of course, is prosperity,” she added.

“We’ve been doing that successfully here in the UAE for over 50 years, and we look forward to doing so for many years to come. I would say what is perhaps unique about our partnership with the UAE is how future-oriented and forward-looking that partnership is.”

Strong said the U.S. and UAE would continue to work together in response to the climate crisis. The UAE will host the COP28 climate conference from Nov. 30 through to Dec. 12.

— CNBC’s Ruxandra Iordache contributed to this report.

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Indian energy minister warns of ‘organized chaos’ if oil tops $100 per barrel

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Indian energy minister warns of ‘organized chaos’ if oil tops 0 per barrel

Oil prices surged to their highest level in more than a year on Thursday. The U.S. West Texas Intermediate futures reached $95.03 per barrel, marking the highest cost since August 2022.

Manan Vatsyayana | Afp | Getty Images

India’s minister of petroleum and natural gas warned that there’ll be “organized chaos” if oil prices break above $100 per barrel, but said the South Asian nation is well positioned to weather higher costs. 

“If the price goes above $100, it’s not going to be in the interest of either the producing country or anyone’s interest. You will have large, organized chaos,” Hardeep Singh Puri told CNBC’s Dan Murphy during a panel at the ADIPEC oil and gas conference in Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates on Tuesday.

But “you should not be worrying about the impact on India. India’s a large economy that has a lot of domestic production. We’ll cut back, we’ll do something or the other,” Puri said.

Last week, oil prices surged to their highest levels in more than a year with U.S. West Texas Intermediate futures hitting $95.03 per barrel. Prices have since pulled back, standing at $89.44 a barrel in Wednesday morning trade in Asia.

While Puri was confident that India could navigate higher prices, he warned that other nations may not be able to do so.

“I would worry about what happens to other parts of the developing world … that is really a worrying point,” Puri said, highlighting that rising prices in the last 18 months have placed “100 million people into abject poverty.” 

“They had to go from reasonably priced gas and cooking fuels [to] wet wood, coal or whatever they could get. That is the problem.” 

Hardeep Singh Puri, India’s minister of Petroleum and Natural Gas, at the ADIPEC conference in Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates, on Tuesday, Oct. 3, 2023.

Bloomberg | Bloomberg | Getty Images

The minister said on X, the social media platform previously known as Twitter, that oil producers need to be mindful of the struggles consuming countries face. 

“During the pandemic, when crude oil prices crashed, the world came together to stabilize the prices to make it sustainable for the producers. Now, as the world is at cusp of economic recession & slowdown, oil producers need to show [the] same sensitivity towards the consuming countries,” he said in a post.

India’s energy transition 

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Quick Charge Podcast: October 3, 2023

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Quick Charge Podcast: October 3, 2023

Listen to a recap of the top stories of the day from Electrek. Quick Charge is available now on Apple PodcastsSpotifyTuneIn and our RSS feed for Overcast and other podcast players.

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