For the first time in long period: Belarusian citizen to take part in Davos economic forum

For the first time in 24 years a Belarusian is taking part in the World Economic Forum in Davos.

It has been 45 years since the first conference: in 1971 German economist Klaus Schwab brought together 450 leaders for what was then called the European Management Symposium.

Over 40 heads of state and 2,500 other participants from 140 countries have arrived at the remote Swiss resort town of Davos. They are unlikely to run short of topics to discuss. The official theme of the forum this year is the ‘fourth industrial revolution’ and how technological changes will alter the way we travel, live, work and do business. Top managers of Google, Alibaba Group, Airbnb, Cisco, Dell, Hewlett Packard, Facebook, etc are expected to speak out on the subject.

The refugee crisis, inequality, climate change and rising interest rates are also among the big themes.

Among those who are participating in the cultural panels there are musicians Peter Gabriel, Bono, actors Kevin Spacey and Leonardo DiCaprio who has been honoured for his work against the climate crisis at the forum.

At the 2016 forum our compatriot Dzyanis Kolga is to tell about the idea of the Minsk hub – a platform for solving conflicts that erupted in the post-Soviet world.

“The Minsk hub is part of Global ShapersCommunity which is kind of the youth wing of the World Economic Forum. The community is a global network of organizations that address local and global issues. Fifty members of this community who presented the most interesting initiatives to take up global challenges, were officially invited to Davos,” Mr Kolga told news site ej.by.

Until now, only one citizen of Belarusians participated in the forum:  Stanislau Shushkevich, the then chairman of the Supreme Council, attended the event in 1992.