On 18 June Friends for Leadership (FFL) international network together with the Roscongress Foundation, TV BRICS and Ruspromo held the online event about next generation projects one year after the SPIEF with our special guests UN Under-Secretary-General and Special Advisor on UN-75 and Digital Cooperation Fabrizio Hochschild and Minister of the Moscow Government, Head of the Department on External Economic and International Relations Sergey Cheremin. Organisers of the discussion have received a letter with the best wishes for the success of the event on behalf of the United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres.

Co-founder of Accelerating Asia Amra Naidoo (Singapore), founder and CEO of Inter African Research Consultancy Raymond Matlala (South Africa), founder of NANOTICA Agro Matias Badano (Argentina), founder and CEO of Youth INC Baljaa Chinzorigt (Mongolia), Kids of Kathmandu executive director Bhushan Dahal (Nepal), founder of the All Opportunities youth platform Gustavs Upmanis  (Latvia) together with our special guests discussed the projects from SPIEF 2019 as a part of the #SPIEFtime campaign. Participants of the discussion provided their vision on how the international community could work together and help scaling efficient best practices and solutions for both post-crisis recovery and achievement of the Sustainable Development Agenda in line with the UN-75 process. 

During the event, in his opening remarks, Fabrizio Hochschild spoke about the global challenges that the international community faces: “There are certain moments in history where it changes chapters dramatically, and there is a broad feeling that it is another major moment with the COVID-19 pandemic, with the preceding crisis of multilateralism, with the threat of climate change at another major shift in history. What international cooperation will look like after that era we are about to enter into, whether it will be strengthened or weakened is an open question. And we believe in working together as we have been doing so far, to make sure that the world adopts a path of greater sanity and not a path of greater conflict and isolationism”.

In his speech, Sergei Cheremin spoke about a situation in the largest cities in the world and their fears about similar crises in future. “Not a single megalopolis in the world was ready for so many infected people. Cities did not have so much backup medical equipment and trained medical personnel. Moreover, no one could have imagined that the damage to the economy would be so severe, especially for small and medium-sized enterprises”, the minister said. Also, Sergey Cheremin emphasized that only by joint efforts it is possible to overcome the situation with coronavirus. “International cooperation, regular video conferences and the exchange of experience with various cities will help us avoid the worst-case scenario in future”, the Minister emphasized.

The moderator of the event, FFL founding member Roman Chukov, noted that during the Russian House in Davos in January 2020, an agreement was signed with the Moscow Department on External Economic and International Relations on the development of an international community for the exchange of best practices in the development of sustainable cities, Friends of Cities, at the venue of the Roscongress Foundation. The projects of the participants are aimed at scaling up the best practices and projects ensuring the sustainability of modern urban agglomerations in accordance with the 11 Sustainable Development Goal of the UN and the UN-Habitat New Urban Agenda. This initiative is part of the Friends for Leadership network of next generation leaders and entrepreneurs from more than 60 countries, launched in 2018 by the joint efforts of Ruspromo and Roscongress at the SPIEF.

The event broadcast is available on YouTube and Facebook accounts of Friends for Leadership and SPIEF in English. The outcome video will be soon available in Russian and English on the Roscongress YouTube channel, as well as on TV BRICS and Ruspromo.