Today, the Business 20 (B20) Summit in Bali, Indonesia, has come to an end, with Indonesia handing over the B20 Presidency to India. The B20 is a global dialogue forum for business leaders and is the business arm of the G20. Over two days, the summit brought together over 3,300 people, including over 2,000 CEOs, business leaders and heads of state, to address key business challenges under the theme ‘Advancing Innovative, Inclusive, and Collaborative Growth’. Combined, these leaders represented over 6.5 million businesses from more than 40 countries.
M. Arsjad Rasjid P. M., Chairman of the Indonesian Chamber of Commerce and Industry (KADIN Indonesia), said “The B20 Summit has brought together global business leaders to advance collaborative action for a more prosperous and inclusive future. Their support in shaping our recommendations to the G20 will make a difference to lives of millions of people. I would also like to offer Indonesia’s best wishes to India as it takes on the B20 Presidency and builds on our efforts to achieve sustainable economic growth.”
Shinta Widjaja Kamdani, Chair of B20 Indonesia and CEO of Sintesa Group, said “Under Indonesia’s Presidency, the B20 has been a fantastic success. We are excited to witness the G20 taking forward our policy recommendations to address global business challenges, driving forward sustainable and inclusive economic growth. The past two days are a testament to the readiness of the global business community to support these efforts. Let’s keep up this momentum.”
The B20 leadership is committed to ensuring Indonesia’s B20 Presidency has a lasting impact. This will be achieved through several ways.
Firstly, the B20 has made 25 policy recommendations for the G20 to take forward, across priority areas including innovation, empowering MSMEs and vulnerable groups, and collaboration between developed and developing countries. These have been set out in the B20’s official Communiqué, published today. The Communiqué aims to drive collaborative action and calls on G20 governments to put forward national policies on these priority areas and foster increased economic growth.
Secondly, the B20 initiated 4 legacy programs to help address today’s global challenges:
Carbon Centre of Excellence, a knowledge hub to help companies transition to a low-carbon economy through providing information on carbon trading;
B20 Wiki, a platform to scale up the development of next generation mid-sized companies;
One Women Global Empowerment, a platform to assist existing women empowerment networks and initiatives to scale and make a bigger impact;
Global One Shot Campaign, to increase access to vaccines and help consign preventable disease to history.
And thirdly, the B20 has generated new investment for Indonesia from at least 11 new investments at the B20 Investment Summit, across key sectors including shipbuilding, aeronautical engineering and defence. Combined, these investments will create new employment opportunities across Indonesia.
The news comes as President Joko Widodo of the Republic of Indonesia launched a $1.4 billion Pandemic Fund to mark the start of the G20. The fund will assist developing countries in managing and coping with future pandemics and other global health threats. Guests ranging from President Yoon Suk-yeol of the Republic of Korea, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau of Canada, Prime Minister Anthony Albanese of Australia, CEO Tesla Inc Elon Musk, UN Women Goodwill Ambassador Anne Hathaway, Binance CEO Changpeng Zhao, Executive Chairman of the Tony Blair Institute for Global Change Tony Blair, and many others also spoke on the final day of the conference.
The B20 Presidency was supported by prominent Indonesian CEOs who led preparation of the recommendations to the G20. It was also guided by a group of international business leaders from top companies in G20 countries, called the International Advocacy Caucus. The caucus includes leaders such as Michael R. Bloomberg and Brad Smith, and together its members assisted the B20 leadership on its agenda and priorities, providing valuable insight.
