The St-Petersburg International Economic Forum (SPIEF) is a key economic event in Russia gathering top business representatives, government officials and media each year. Our VP for Procurement & Sustainability Richard White attended the event this year, taking the opportunity to share our sustainability agenda with various audiences.
White participated in panel discussions and radio interviews addressing everything from changes to the labour market and the potential impact of artificial intelligence in today’s fast paced world to the importance of SMEs as contributors to GDP and as readily innovative.
During the “Transformation of the international labour market: meeting the challenges” panel discussion, White spoke about the importance of employee ownership and how our people can become a powerful voice in support of our company’s sustainability agenda, with the capacity to become the drivers for the real change.
In contract, the discussion “Major Russian and foreign corporations vs small and medium-sized enterprises: building trust between customer and supplier” gave us the chance to reflect on how we can drive engagement beyond our company walls. White highlighted that a resilient supply chain is a key factor of success for a business and that sustainability is one of the main procurement and sourcing criteria for our company.
We believe that support for small and medium-sized suppliers both to secure our company’s future and to improve socio-economic standards of the local communities in which the SMEs operate is a priority across the globe. We were pleased to participate so widely at this year’s SPIEF and hope to be back next year to continue the conversation.
