Distinguished Students, Organising Committee, Company representatives, Ladies and Gentlemen.

Good afternoon and welcome to CBS Case Competition’s Panel Debate 2017.

Today’s world is full of challenges, but there also exists opportunities.

Today, there are believed to be more than 120 million people in need of humanitarian assistance. These are people affected by conflicts, like the ones in Syria or Yemen. They are people suffering from chronic hunger and malnutrition as we are witnessing in South Sudan. They are people struggling to put their lives back together in the aftermath of natural disasters such as in Nepal’s Kathmandu valley, or in the wake of floods in South-East Asia.

There are more than 65 million people that have fled from their homes and can expect to live as a refugee for an average today of 17 years. 

Numbers like these have never been seen before. Over the past decade, humanitarian need has grown at a disturbing rate. It is expected that this growth will continue, driven in part by conflicts as well as by factors such as climate change, inequality, population growth and displacement, unplanned urbanization and unequal and inadequate access to food, water, health and energy

We need to find the opportunities in the challenges, take a longer view, and use more of the resources available to us. Our answer to these challenges cannot simply be more of the same.  We are at the beginning of a new era of development - and a window of opportunity exists to rethink traditional approaches to persistent global challenges.

In September 2015, the new Sustainable Development Agenda was unanimously adopted by the 193 Member States of the United Nations.

We now have 17 Global Goals and 169 targets that provide the blueprint for the world’s development Agenda that will guide us through to 2030. 

It is a broad, universal Agenda to end poverty, fight inequality and protect the environment, and one could say, this Agenda is the most ambitious in history.

The world has made a promise to make the strongest effort to end poverty, ensure quality education for all, promote peaceful and inclusive societies for sustainable development, provide access to justice for all, and build effective, accountable and inclusive institutions at all levels – and that is to name just a few of the goals.

Implementation of the Agenda and how we measure progress is extremely complex and the success of the Agenda will be dependent on our ability to implement and make it happen. To turn the promise of the Agenda into a reality in lives of women, men, boys and girls from all corners of the globe. 

Everyone and every country must take ownership of the Agenda.  In order to achieve real and sustainable change it will require active participation of all sectors of society; individuals, communities, companies, international organizations and governments all working towards these common global goals.

Sustainable Development for people, planet and prosperity provides new opportunities for growth but to truly capitalize on those opportunities it will require new and innovative partnerships across continents, regions and countries and between the public and private sectors. It will require new business models and news ways of thinking.  As I said, we simply cannot continue doing more of the same.

Ban Ki-Moon, former Secretary-General of the United Nations stated, in this respect:

“Governments must take the lead in living up to their pledges. At the same time, I am counting on the private sector to drive success.”

And the Global Goals will be a driving force for opening new markets and creating a better enabling environment for business. And as such, present a wide spectrum of opportunities for visionary companies.

We need to move from, for example, businesses having a separate CSR strategy to an integrated approach - where an increased societal responsibly also can result in growth and increased profit for that business. There is a growing acceptance that it is OK to “do well, by doing good”. 

For developing countries to become independent of development aid, it will require increased international trade and investment.  It will require the private sector to drive job development and sustainable growth.

However, sustainable growth cannot be achieved if half of the country’s population is denied equal access to quality education, health services and information, economic and political participation, as well as equal opportunities for employment, leadership and decision-making at all levels.

I strongly believe gender equality and the empowerment of women and girls will create some of the greatest opportunities of our time.

Women and girls as critical drivers of development have been strongly recognized throughout the Global Goals and as crucial to progress across all 17 goals.

Greater gender equality in a country is linked to a higher level of education and better health, higher per capita income, stronger international competitiveness and more inclusive and rapid economic growth.  The business case for promoting gender equality is just as convincing.   A growing body of evidence points to the many ways that women contribute value to each link of the business value chain; as suppliers, leaders, employees, customers, entrepreneurs and community members.

So, when companies improve conditions for girls and women, it also makes good business sense – “Doing well, by doing good.”

According to UN Women:

• An analysis of Fortune 500 companies found that those with the greatest representation of women in management positions delivered a total return to shareholders that was 34% higher than for companies with the lowest representation.
• If women had the same access as men to productive assets, agricultural output in 34 developing countries would rise by an estimated average of up to 4 %. This could reduce the number of undernourished people in those countries by as much as 17 %, translating to up to 150 million fewer hungry people.

Many Danish companies are at the forefront of promoting women’s economic empowerment and ensuring the inclusion of women in the workplace – and this is how they also operate when they do business in developing countries.

An example which I have used a number of times is the Danish company Orana, which has changed their working week hours, in order to ensure their employees a better work-life balance. Instead of working late Monday to Saturday, as is the norm in Vietnam, employees at Orana work Monday to Friday, from 7.30am – 4pm. This means that Orana’s employees are able to pick up their children from kindergarten and keep them at home.

Whereas many Vietnamese families, with two working parents, have to send their children to live with their grandparents. Initiatives like this make it possible for women to work, and is an important model for the inclusion of women in the labour-force, in a sustainable way. For Orana, the change has resulted in happier and more loyal employees, and ‑ a more effective factory.

Danish companies also contribute to women’s empowerment through their products and services. When Grundfos installs a so-called ‘Water ATM’ in a village, women save hours that were previously used fetching water every day. These saved hours are now often used on income-generating activities that benefit the family.

I have witnessed during my travels, that given the opportunity, women in developing countries show an astonishing talent for entrepreneurship. Unfortunately, many women are deprived of the opportunity to start their own business, or they are hindered along the way by, for example, rigid and counterproductive legislation.

In some countries, women are not allowed to start a business or to own land without their husband’s consent. Often, they do not have access to credit to the same degree as their male counterparts, and they are often subjected to unjustified harassment by the authorities.

Gender equality is a basic human right. It is not only the right thing to do, it is also smart economics. It is one of the most important driving forces behind economic growth and the fight against poverty.

Another factor that is fundamental to having any chance of achieving the global goals is the involvement and leadership of young people in the implementation, monitoring and accountability of them.

I’m sure you have heard it before, and you will no doubt hear it again: tomorrow’s leaders are the youth of today. And that is true for some of you and some of you may already be leaders but, in each and every one of us, and maybe it is just for a moment, there is a leader.

I’d like to share with you the words of Robert F. Kennedy:

“Few will have the greatness to bend history itself; but each of us can work to change a small portion of events, and in the total of all those acts will be written the history of this generation.”

The youth, that’s you guys, have a central role to play. You have a duty to challenge the status quo and the strategies of today’s leaders. And there is no doubt that what you have to offer is needed. Your youthful restless energy, innovative and creative thinking and problem-solving and your commitment and courage to creating a vision for the future and the strategy for getting there are invaluable.

Today, roughly one quarter of the world’s populations is between 10-24 years old – that’s an unprecedented 1.8 billion young people.  That presents both an enormous potential and an enormous challenge.

Harnessing the potential of this large group will have a crucial impact on the sustainable development of our world.  If we don’t harness that potential, the result for the individual, the country and the world can be devastating. Disillusion, frustration and lack of hope for one’s future can lead to further social instability and migration.  

We are already witnessing the highest levels of youth unemployment in history – an estimated 358 million young people around the world are currently not in education, employment or training - that is more than the population of the USA and Canada combined.

At the same time there is increasing concern over talent scarcity.  The youth population simply doesn’t have the knowledge, skills and experience to meet the demands of the current labor market. And there are not enough jobs for those that do.

We need to generate sustainable economic growth, again the public and private sectors have a large role to play here; and that is to create more jobs and give young people the skills and confidence to fill them. 

How can businesses turn this challenge into an opportunity that benefits their bottom line while at the same time supporting the youth in reaching their full human potential?

All of you represent an enormous potential, a potential that can contribute to meeting the challenges of today and making the most of new opportunities to the benefit of us all.

I hope that what I have said has helped to set the scene for your discussions and deliberations over the coming days. I’m very much looking forward to the debate that will take place shortly.  It will give us an opportunity to hear different perspectives, ideas and thoughts and the chance to question them.

There is no doubt that the challenges ahead are daunting, but one thing is certain, rising to the challenge will require perseverance and joint effort – it will require collaboration, no one can do it alone. 

We all have a role to play.

Thank you.