Social business could contribute to advancing the Millennium Development Goals
Friday, July 1st, 2011Another reference to the Millennium Development Goals came from a Bangladeshi contact today.
A conference in Bangladesh on Social Business Day [28th June] had many participants from around the world. Social business is not yet in the mainstream of United Nations thinking but at this event there were good examples showing that social business works.
In an exclusive interview with The Daily Star in Dhaka Thomas Stelzer, the assistant secretary-general of the United Nations for policy coordination and inter-agency affairs, who works closely with UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon on millennium development goals, talked about what he learnt from the Social Business Day celebrations.
He focused on the challenges that lie ahead for achieving MDGs and how social business can complement other efforts in reaching the goals. He said:
”Social business is one of the economic theories, which is achieving a breakthrough — acceptability. People will invest in social business more and more — with a clear purpose. People will know why they are investing in it, which is a departure from the usual way of investment.
”In conventional investment, you have a shareholding value, returns and income, whereas in social business you don’t have all of that and you have to conceptualise why you are investing. In social business, the vital question will be about qualitative, not quantitative growth.
”People do things they are satisfied with and invest for different reasons. For many, it is a game and sport and they always think how they can maximise the outcome of their investments. What is the reason for putting $15-20 billion in your account?
”But in social business, things change. A social business investor looks for satisfaction, but you draw your satisfaction differently, not by accumulating wealth, but by investing the energy of your life in a way that makes you feel good. It is an altruistic, socially-oriented understanding of how you can contribute to today’s economy.
”I think social business decisively contribute to advancing MDGs. Achieving MDGs through social business alone will be a bit narrow. But I am convinced that social business very strongly influences the acceleration of implementation.
“We at the United Nations look at what works. MDGs are at the core of our work. So we look into every possibility of implementing MDGs. Social business seems to be a good option to complement many other efforts. This is how I look at it. So we are not in the business of choosing one over the other. Social business seems to work in this context. ”
To read the Daily Star article click here.