Danish toymaker Lego Group started Thursday construction of its first carbon-neutral factory site worldwide, located in southern Vietnam, with more than $1 billion in total investment.
Visiting Danish Crown Prince Frederik joined the groundbreaking ceremony together with Vietnamese Deputy Prime Minister Pham Binh Minh as this is the largest investment in Vietnam to date made by a Danish company.
“Today’s event marks a significant milestone for our first carbon-neutral facility, and our sixth manufacturing site,” Lego Group CEO Niels B. Christiansen said, adding it would be his group’s second site in Asia, with the first Asian plant in China.
The new advanced facility will cover 44 hectares in Vietnam-Singapore Industrial Park III in Binh Duong province, around 50 kilometers from Ho Chi Minh City. The toy maker said it expected to start production in 2024, with 4,000 jobs to be created over the next 15 years.
The carbon-neutral factory will feature solar panels on its roof and VSIP Group, the developer of the industrial park, will build a nearby solar farm on behalf of Lego. Combined, the two solar systems will match 100% of the factory’s annual energy requirements. The factory is designed to accommodate electric vehicles and be outfitted with energy-efficient production.
The new production site will help the Danish firm expand its global supply chain network, which locates factories close to its major markets, Lego said.
VSIP Group is a joint venture between Singapore’s Sembcorp Industries and Binh Duong-based Becamex, a Vietnamese leading industrial developer. At present, Lego and VSIP are planting about 50,000 trees in Vietnam to compensate for vegetation removed during the construction of the new plant.
Sembcorp Industries on October 17 received an investment license to develop a new industrial park covering 294 hectares in Can Tho city as the first VSIP park in the Mekong Delta.
Can Tho is a class-one city of Vietnam on par with Hai Phong in the north and Danang in the central region, second to only Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam’s two largest metropolises.