The government is serious in leading the efforts to tackle the issues of global climate change by encouraging adaptation measures and strategic environmental-friendly development plan for people's wellbeing and economic growth, Tan Sri Muhyiddin Yassin said.

The deputy prime minister said this initiative would need active participation from the private sector and the business community to ensure that each level of their commercial activity would be environmental friendly or would achieve the best green standards.

"I hope the private sector and the business community will not procrastinate any longer and will take immediate action to formulate an environmental-friendly business strategy, if they haven't done so.

"If they already formulated the strategy, it should be implemented and put into practice because the costs of rehabilitation for environmental damage will be very high. Worse still, the damage may be beyond repair," he said at the presentation ceremony of the Prime Minister's Hibiscus Award 2012/2013 here Friday.

Muhyiddin said if the sustainable development process could be implemented effectively by the entrepreneur community, it would also help generate higher commercial profit margins and most importantly, able to increase the living conditions and wellbeing of the people in the long run.

Muhyiddin said the government also appreciate the roles played by multi-national companies which had various resources to implement sustainable development programmes as compared to smaller companies.

"In fact, most of these multi-national companies have and still trying to find ways and means to improve their practice and quality at every level," he said.

The deputy prime minister said the government had always encouraged small and medium-scale enterprises (SME) to be creative in implementing the green process at various levels of their commercial activities.

However, he said the government realised that most SME were facing cost-related issues to maintain their profit margins.

As such, he said the SME community should make optimal use of the various financial and non-financial incentives made available by the government to help them adopt the concept and implement sustainable development in their business operations.

Muhyiddin said the rising global demand for environmental-friendly technology was proof that it was among the new business opportunities that local entrepreneurs should venture into.

Besides, he said in a bid to continue efforts to preserve and protect the natural ecosystem, the relevant laws should be reviewed and updated according to the federal constitution.

On the Prime Minister's Hibiscus Award, Muhyiddin hoped it would continue playing its roles to improve awareness on the importance of preserving the environment among more industries and SME.

At the event, Star Publication (Malaysia) Bhd won the Environmental Journalism Award.