Social Business Youth Alliance (SBYA) is non-profit youth-led organization that brings the youth of the world together to change their communities for the better through collaborative efforts. At the core of SBYA’s model is harnessing the power of youth, entrepreneurship, and technology to bring social change. 8 of the 10 core members of the SBYA Team are OYW Ambassadors and their work has been significant in achieving OYW’s mandate all over the globe.
Driven by the ideals of Nobel Laureate Prof. Muhammad Yunus, SBYA’s purpose is to interpret, brainstorm, and disburse the concept of Social Business among the youth and the young at heart alike. To spread their mission and vision far and wide, after organizing 4 successful summits in Dhaka, in collaboration with Yunus Center at AIT, they branched out and took the Social Business Youth Summit 2018 in Bangkok.
With the theme “Disruptive Technologies for Social Impact”, 200 participants from over 20 countries came together in Bangkok from March 29-30 and immersed themselves in technological innovations to redefine our world, explore their potential, and scale their impact. The two-day event was packed with thought provoking plenary and breakout sessions.
Dr. Faiz Shah, Director, Yunus Center AIT and Shazeeb M Khairul Islam, Founder, SBYA Global inaugurated the event pondering upon the importance of the “3-Zeros” as described in the latest book by Prof. Yunus: zero hunger, zero poverty, and zero net carbon emission. The duo also elucidated the significance of youth involvement in social businesses for overall social development. Via a video footage, the Nobel laureate himself emphasized that the pursuit of financial gain and profit maximization should not take precedence over solving social problems, and for that youth involvement is paramount
The event’s kickstarting keynote, “Shaping The Fourth Industrial Revolution”, was by Leonhard Nima, Co-Founder, N3XTCODER. The keynote was followed by a plenary session on “Harnessing the power of Disruptive Tech with Social Business to achieve SDGs.” Dr. Faiz Shah, Director, Yunus Center, Martin Hart-Hansen, Deputy Resident Representative, UNDP Thailand, Parveen Mahmud, Managing Director, Grameen Telecom Trust, Mr. Kiatchai Maitriwong, Sr. Executive VP, Corporate Strategic Planning and Sustainability Group, Bangchak Corp., and OYW Ambassador Arch Wongchindawest, CEO, Social Giver spoke in the panel. The next panel session on “Celebrating Women Leaders” was graced by Anne Somanas, Nicole Jones Crossley and Sivalee Anantachart from Akin Asia, Women Who Lead and Cryptoladies Bangkok respectively.
One Young World presence was strongly felt on the panel session on “Building Impactful Network of Social Entrepreneurs”, which was hosted by Nousheen Zoarder, OYW Coordinating Ambassador for Asia 1. The session was led by Ada Chirapaisarnkul, and panelists Treerat Sirichantaropas, Sabon Wangsrangboon, Arch Wongchindawest, Niruch Vanichwatanarumluk , and Nutch Poovarawan They discussed how people a few years back did not care about climate change and realize its effects, and how that has changed, how empowerment of the poor result in lasting development, how changemakers from developed nations can help solve local problems in a country and the role of effective dialogue exchange in facilitating positive and sustainable change.
Day 2 of the event hosted the plenary sessions on “Shaping the Social Business Ecosystem in Our Communities” and “Empowering Youth with Social Business”. Throughout the summit, workshops were help on topics including, “Changing Lifestyle Habits”, “Knowing Oneself”, “Human centered Design Sprint Immersive Workshop”, “How do we design blockchain to change lives”, and one on “Effective Communition”. The penultimate event for the Summit was a pitch competition on “Top Innoveations from Designs Blockchain Bootcamp”.
Founder of SBYA Global, Mr. Shazeeb M, Khairul Islam ended the 2-day Summit with a note of hope and aspiration, calling to action the future social business enthusiasts and entrepreneurs to take their learning and apply them in their own communities.
Read the full press release here.
