HM The King's speech at SACC Green Summit
New York, USA
(The spoken version shall take precedence)
Your Majesty,
Your Excellencies,
Ladies and Gentlemen,
Her Majesty the Queen and I are glad to be here again. We had the pleasure to attending the first Green Summit that the Swedish-American Chamber of Commerce organized already in 1998. I would like to compliment the Chamber of Commerce for its on-going efforts in promoting sustainability. At that time, 14 years ago, the topic and question was: "Can a corporation be both sustainable and profitable?" Today the question is the opposite: "Can a corporation be profitable, if it is not sustainable?"
The issue has been highlighted at the Green Summits over the past 5 years. Sustainability has moved into balance accounts and the board rooms of corporations worldwide.
Sustainability is close to Swedish hearts. Sweden is one of the countries taking a leading role in environmental work. We organized the first U.N. conference on the environment in Stockholm in 1972. During the oil crisis of the 70's and 80's, efforts were made to find new sources of energy, create new ways to insulate buildings and develop automatic energy saving systems, and so on.
Sustainable growth is a shared responsibility. The successful cooperation between local, regional and national authorities and private industry has been important factors in turning ideas of sustainability into reality. In the past decade sustainability ideas have been implemented with increasing frequency on a larger scale.
I had also the great pleasure of attending the Chamber's first Green Summit in 2008 discussing "Alternative Energy." And today Her Majesty the Queen and I are looking forward to today's discussions about "Feeding a City." We will listen with great interest to the thoughts.
So, let us hope for a fruitful seminar. I hope you will make the most of this day, and listen and learn from each other.
Thank you!
