Caux Initiatives for Business (CIB) encourages business leaders, young professionals, NGO representatives, trade unionists, experts and decision makers to work together to bridge the gap between the theory and practice of values - in personal conduct and in economic life.
Download the CIB factsheet (PDF)
Melbourne Australia ‘Rediscovering Leadership’ 18 November, 2008
 |
Conference Announcement – 24 to 29 July, 2009 at Caux, Switzerland
Trust and Integrity in the Global Economy (TIGE)
A people-focused, sustainable approach to globalization
We face difficult challenges in the global economy which at times seem hard to overcome; food shortages, crises in financial systems, the impact of climate change and rising energy costs are only a few. TIGE believes that sustainable solutions will be led by nothing short of breakthrough thinking; a dynamic way of leading and of being, with trust and integrity at the core.
The TIGE conference invites young professionals, business school students, social entrepreneurs, business leaders, farmers, media professionals, academics, NGO’s, and all those who have a sense of concern to be part of a uniquely collaborative conference that builds a people focused, virtue based, and proactive approach to the problems confronting us.
To register your Interest Email us.
 |
Conference Update Trust and Integrity in the Global Economy (TIGE): Cultivating Knowledge - Generating Action Held on 11 July – 16 July, 2008
Corporate Leaders say Short Term Results Contribute to Financial Crisis Corporate leaders from Europe, Japan and India met at Caux, Switzerland and announced their deep concern about the demand for quarterly results which made managers too focused on share prices and short term outcomes.
Meeting at Caux, the International Conference Centre for Initiatives of Change in Switzerland, the group included Dr Jamshed Irani, board member of Tata Sons Ltd in India, Toru Hashimoto, Chairman of Deutsche Securities in Japan, and Dr Jean-Pierre Mean, group general council and chief compliance officer of SGS Ltd, Geneva, the world’s leading inspection, testing and certification company.
Presenting their report to the Trust & Integrity in the Global Economy conference, the business leaders called for long-term thinking and the need for CEOs to remain in office for longer terms than the current three to five year cycle, prevalent in some countries.
Dr Mean who delivered the report added that ‘we have to restore human rights as an absolute and intangible value for the whole of humanity’. He deplored investors hunger for on-going short term gains on the share market. ‘This has contributed a lot to the current financial crisis,’ he said.
Proposed Action
The Corporate leaders listed a series of steps to increase the responsibility of corporations in the global economy as follows –
Raymond Baker says Our Financial System Facilitates Illicit Fund Transfers
Raymond W Baker, author of Capitalism’s Achilles Heel, was delivering a public Caux Lecture on ‘Financing a secure world’. Baker, a leading anti corruption campaigner from the US said that illicit international transfers amounted on conservative estimates to 1-1.6 trillion dollars, about half of which was funds leaving poor countries and going to rich countries.
An entire structure now existed to move money from the poor to the rich, Baker continued, ‘cutting the heart out of foreign aid. 50-80 billion dollars a year in official foreign aid was outweighed ten-fold by some 500-800 billion coming back in the other direction. ‘This cannot work for the poor countries, and it cannot work for the rich,’ Baker said.
Russia in recent years had seen the greatest theft of resources in human history, and China was rapidly following in the same game. Nigeria had seen the greatest percentage of GDP stolen in any one country, where 70% of the population lives on between one and two dollars a day. The Congo had seen the longest rip-off in history and, since the year 2000, some 4.5 million people had been killed there: ‘economic deprivation kills’ Baker emphasised. ‘What would happen if a large part of these funds stayed in the poor countries?’ he asked.
Biggest Loop Hole in Economic System
Baker said that Illicit money transfers took three forms - bribery and theft of local elites, the proceeds of criminal activities, and commercial tax evasion. ‘Corrupt countries’ contribute about 3% of the total, he noted, while 30-35% was criminal, the largest part, 60-65% was commercial tax evasion.
This international system has been largely developed since the 1960s, driven by two forces: ‘the desire of economic and political elites in poor countries wanting to move capital out – and we in the West helped them – and the spread of multi-national business’. There were now 91 tax havens, and millions of disguised corporations. Drug dealers and criminals didn’t need to invent any new ways or new channels. This constituted ‘the biggest loophole in the global economic system,’ he asserted.
‘We in the West are not innocent victims,’ he said. ‘We developed techniques and structures for illicit international money transfers – and now they come back to bite us.’ ‘What part of our standard of living do we in the West want to owe to slave trading, trafficking in women, counterfeiting?’ he asked. ‘We just don’t want to know,’ he suggested.
About CIB
Caux Initiatives for Business (CIB) is an Initiatives of Change program. CIB encourages business leaders, young professionals, NGO representatives, trade unionists, experts and decision makers to work together to bridge the gap between the theory and practice of values in everyday life.
CIB engages all these stakeholders in building trust and integrity in the global economy, seeking to meet human needs in the context of a sustainable world and deal with economic insecurity - a major root cause of conflict and suffering in today's world.
CIB organizes –
CIB works together with other groups and organisations such as The Farmer's Dialogue, International Communications Forum and Centre for Training in Ethical Leadership (India) , IC Centre for Governance (India), Transparency International and the Caux Round Table
CIB annual conferences are held at Caux in Switzerland and Asia Plateau in India.
Nigel Heywood, Team Leader, of the international Action for Life programme reports on Conversations that Matter on ‘Leadership and Values’, held on 24th June in Melbourne, Australia.
Caux Initiatives for Business (CIB) and the Initiatives of Change Centre in Melbourne, Australia hosted Conversations that Matter with 40 people on the theme of Leadership and Values. The two speakers were Andrew Horsfield and Saurabh Mishra. Download Saurabh’s slides More...
 |
Caux Initiatives for Business is working in association with JADE, a student-run, pan-European network representing about 20.000 young entrepreneurs in more than 225 local non-profit organisations, called Junior Enterprises. By running professional consulting projects and managing small- to medium sized enterprises, the students add practical experience to their theoretical skills, develop entrepreneurship at an early stage, broaden their horizons and, of course, prepare themselves for challenging careers throughout Europe. JADE has promoted the CIB Trust and Integrity in the Global Economy conference to all its members through its newsletters and website. For more on JADE click here NEWS
 |
Michael Smith, freelance journalist from the UK and author of Trust and Integrity in the Global Economy – stories of people making a difference, spoke about his book at a Greencoat Forum in the London centre of Initiatives of Change on 15 April 2008. More...