PETALING JAYA (Aug 22): Sustainability may be a trendy word right now, but how seriously do we take it and what does it mean in our everyday life and business?

One company that has made the commitment to integrate sustainability in its business is Ikea.

“As a retailer and shopping centre developer, there are three ways how Ikea Southeast Asia approaches this matter — by engaging more people for a more sustainable everyday life, reducing climate impact for a better planet and taking social responsibility for a better life for people and the communities,” Ikea Southeast Asia (Singapore) head of sustainability Lee Hui Mien told TheEdgeProperty.com.

Lee will be sharing more about Ikea Southeast Asia’s sustainability journey in the upcoming Future Forward Forum 2017 — Trends: Insite on Sept 7.

She will not only talk about how Ikea incorporates sustainability into the development process, but also “the hits and misses in realising the ambition in the last few years as well as its future initiatives, particularly on the green building space”.

Organised by Rehda Youth, a division of the Real Estate and Housing Developers’ Association Malaysia, the forum brings together visionaries working across different specialisations under the property development umbrella to share and create a discourse around future trends that can sustain, propel or disrupt the industry.

The forum will be presented in two sessions. The first session is themed “Future-planning: Emerging trends in sustainable projects” while the second session will be on “Digital disruption: Programming the property industry”.

The first session will feature Lee and presentations from Ho & Partners Architects Engineers & Development Consultants Ltd (Hong Kong) deputy managing director Nicholas Ho and SPARK Architects (Singapore) director Stephen Pimbley. Speakers for the second session will be Builk Asia Co Ltd (Thailand) principal Patai Padungtin, Panasonic Malaysia strategic B2B development general manager Tan Chee Hon and Shanghai Distrii Technology Development Co Ltd (China) CEO and founder Dr Hu Jing.

Hu will be talking about the impact of technology in the workplace. “With technological advancements, organisations in the future will be very different. Just as how the Internet of Things have changed our lives, the idea of a ‘job’ and an ‘office’ will no longer be as how we see it today,” said Hu, who was the former chief architect and executive vice-president of Greenland Holdings Corp Ltd.

“The future workplace will show more shared, flexible and mobile features, thus increasing efficiency and making work more enjoyable,” he added.

Distrii currently has co-working spaces across 15 locations in Shanghai, Beijing and Hangzhou, with 14 more locations to be opened by end-2017. Making its first international foray, Distrii will lease over 60,000 sq ft of space at Republic Plaza, to create one of the largest co-working facilities in Singapore central business district. The facility is expected to open in the first half of 2018.

The Future Forward Forum 2017 is organised in partnership with Nippon Paint Malaysia. TheEdgeProperty.com is the official media partner.

This story first appeared in TheEdgeProperty.com pullout on Aug 18, 2017. Download TheEdgeProperty.com pullout here for free.