Jonathan Huy Tran

A small change, repeated every day, will lead to a big change.   

This is the ethos that Jonathan Huy Tran, the Chairman of Asia Commercial Joint Stock Bank (ACB), has communicated through his “Close to O” campaign for the past eight years.   

The short-term goal of the campaign is to foster understanding among ACB’s 15,000 employees about environmental protection and encourage them to make positive changes in their daily habits. The long-term goal is to change attitudes toward the environment with customers and within their larger community.   

Given the severity of the single-use plastics pollution in Vietnam, since 2018 Tran has primarily focused on reducing plastic waste. Discovering ACB’s own annual plastic discharge amounted to about 610,000 kg of plastic per year, ACB invested VND20 billion in practical activities related to reducing their own impact, including:   

• Distributing 25,000 eco-friendly gift sets including multi-use tumblers, straws and non-woven bags to customers.  
• Banning the use of single-use plastic cups and bottles on ACB premises.  

• Replacing single-use plastic bags with 1.2 million recycled or reusable bags.  
• Digitizing processes to save ACB from using 22.7 million sheets of paper. 
• Organizing environmental education events for almost 500 children in the community.  
• Creating challenges designed to encourage ACB units to set goals of plastic waste reduction while supporting local environmental activities such as trash pickups at the beach and sorting waste. 

ACB is accompanying about 200,000 business in their pursuit of ESG goals. And at the close of 2022, ACB began their own journey to reach net zero.  

In recognition of his leadership as Chairman and transforming ACB into a resilient and competitive company, Enterprise Asia awarded him Outstanding Entrepreneur for four consecutive years 2019-2022, and the Asia Corporate Excellence and Sustainability Council honored him as one of the Asia’s Most Admirable Young Leaders 2021.