How can governments and civil society work with business to accelerate sustainable development? What could these partnerships look like?
On Thursday 9 October Nestlé led the discussion around these questions and the changing role of business in society at the 6th Annual Creating Shared Value Forum held in Switzerland and via live webcast, co-hosted with the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD).
With over 200 multi-sector guests in attendance, the day marked a perfect opportunity to take stock of where creating shared value started from, where the global community is at now, and most importantly where it is heading.
Speakers included a selection of high profile guests including Nestlé’s Chairman Peter Brabeck, CEO Paul Bulcke, UNCTAD Secretary-General Mukhisa Kituyi, President of the Swiss Confederation President Didier Burkhalter and Creating Shared Value Co-author Mark Kramer. The sessions and discussions focused on the changing role of business, nutrition and public health, sustainable agriculture and supply chains, and solving water scarcity. Click here to download the full program and list of speakers.
Justin Bakule, Executive Director of the Shared Value Initiative described some of the highlights including how there has been a shift in the dialogue around the role of business in society, from justification to expectation, not just at the Forum but on a global scale. One of the other key points highlighted was that there remains an issue around outlining the ‘how’ for shared value. It is much easier to outline the ‘what is shared value’ than the ‘how’ – establishing how for companies to most effectively embed shared value practices across the business, which is something the Shared Value Initiatives and the global shared value community is working to develop tools for.
The forum also included the announcement of the highly anticipated 2014 Nestlé CSV Prize. The prize was created by Nestlé to help business-orientated initiatives that address challenges in nutrition, water, or rural development, to scale-up or be replicated, and to reward initiatives that reflect the spirit of Creating Shared Value. The 2014 winner was Honey Care Africa, a fair trade honey company, whose objective is to provide opportunities for rural, smallholder households to generate significant additional income through honey production.
The Nestlé CSV Prize is awarded every two years. The call for 2016 nominees is now open, to find out more click here.
To watch video highlights of the forum click here.
To view photos from the forum click here.
