Lohas influence inspires "green" product designs

CEBU, Philippines - As appeals all over the world to help lessen if not solve the global warming escalates, more and more manufacturers have also incorporated environment-friendly measures and features in their products to address this need of the market.

According to Tony Lee, product development manager for Asia Pacific of AOC (art of colors), there is a growing international market adopting the lifestyle of health and sustainability (Lohas) that manufacturers like AOC, which manufacturers television and monitors, have to consider in designing their new product lines.

“The lohas is an emerging market. This is a cultural connotation, an evolution of lifestyle. The issue on environment has already become a main issue of mankind and the company is taking this issue (seriously,)” he told a press conference at the Cebu City Marriott Hotel last Friday.

Lee said some 34 percent of AOC’s market lives on the Lohas principle. This is why AOC has developed and produced a new line of “green” monitors that are equipped with environment-friendly top-of-the-line technology such as the power-saver LED backlight and automatic power-off timer.

While the LED backlight technology helps reduce production of toxic waste, the automatic power-off timer lessens energy consumption.

These “green” monitors have encouraged the company to be more aggressive in marketing their products, to maximize the potential of their products in helping save the environment.

“We are more aggressive not only because we want to continue to be the leader in the industry but also because we want to educate more people on the advantages of our products to the environment. We consider our technology useful but what is the use of these if we won’t communicate their usefulness to the people,” MDR Microware Sales Inc. vice president Elvi Suficiencia said.

MDR is the exclusive distributor of AOC monitors in the Visayas and Mindanao .

AOC’s green monitors are the Luvia, Eco 7, and MASKK.

Suficiencia said these monitors may not be the cheapest in the industry but they are not also the most expensive and are priced accordingly with their features.

While the Lohas market is growing in the Western part of the world, he said that in the Philippines, MDR, through AOC’s “green” monitors would want to help cultivate this market in the country.

“Living the Lohas lifestyle needs political will both within and from the government,” Suficiencia said.