The One Young World summit in Montréal
In August this year, 31 of the best and brightest young entrepreneurs from various countries in Africa and the Middle East travelled to Montréal (Canada) for the One Young World summit. This summit provides a platform where young people from all over the world come together to connect and discuss the global challenges we face in our contemporary global society.
Enterprising Futures Scholarship
The annual One Young World Summit is one of the highlights of the global youth calendar, where thousands of young people from all over the world meet to discuss pressing global topics that are important to them.
The Dutch Ministry of Foreign Affairs, together with the Orange Corners programme, has set up the Enterprising Futures Scholarship, that aims to enable young entrepreneurs from emerging economies to attend this summit. These entrepreneurs were not only selected based on the success of their respective businesses, but also looking at the social and/or environmental impact they have on their communities.
Furthermore, the scholarship often includes a lot of Orange Corners alumni. The delegates are prepared with several online sessions and one in-person workshop on the topic of doing a ‘focus sprint to accelerate your business’, given by the Dutch company The Next Lab. These preparations make sure that they are well equipped to get the most out of the summit. After the summit, they come together again to reflect on what they have taken home from the event and how to implement their learning in their entrepreneurial journey afterwards.
Keynote address
This year, the main topics of the summit included indigenous voices, artificial intelligence, health equity and peace. On the second day of the summit, the Dutch Ambassador for Youth, Education and Work, Jurriaan Middelhoff, shared the main presentation stage with Amin Bolis, a young Sudanese, who leads the organisation Humanity Hands and works on empowering refugees to be self-sustaining through education.
During this keynote they addressed the topic of peace and stability in times of conflict and fragility. Amin shared his experiences from working in the Kukuma Refugee Camp in Kenya and the Ambassador closed off by calling upon larger corporates to take responsibility in promoting inclusion and peace in the countries they operate in.
On the interactive stage, the Ambassador was joined by Ryme Assad from Lebanon, Parfait Mugisha from Burundi and Wamweni Sharlette Samundengu, the Youth Engagement Lead of the African Union. During this session, the panellists debated with each other and the audience on various statements regarding climate change, renewable energy, regenerative agriculture and the transition to a green economy.
Delegates take center stage
Besides panel discussions on the main topics of the summit, two delegates of the Enterprising Futures Scholarship got the opportunity to talk about their inspiring initiatives on the presentation stage. On Friday, Malinese scholar Royale explained about her initiative So'Intim, that employs women from underserved communities. On Saturday, Palestinian scholar Lama shared the experiences from her initiative BuildPalestine, that supports social enterprises to address economic challenges.
Missed One Young World? The live sessions will soon be released on the One Young World website.