Country Forum

There will be a time slot of 3 hours or more during which various countries, provinces, or regions will be invited to organize their own programs to review how social business is taking shape in their countries, who is doing what, what is the plan for next year, what needs to be done, making announcements of upcoming actions.Each country will organize it on their own initiative. Delegates will pay registration fees as usual to come to the SBD and participate in the Forum.

Any country, province, district, region may contact Yunus Centre to present their proposal to organize a Forum during SBD. Only condition for Yunus Centre (YC) to agree on the proposal would be to satisfy itself that the organization or the person have the capacity to be the "Lead Organization " or "Lead Organizer" of the Forum, and that he/she can ensure bringing at least 20 delegates from the country, province, district, or region and he/she can make sure there will be enough speakers from the area for the Forum.

Forum will bring people together and get their interest and understanding of social business deeper. It will inspire each other to get active in solving social problems and build a community of problem-solvers.

Forum will be a window opportunity for delegates of the same country/region to focus on the social problems of their own country, and inspire each other to take initiative to address them.SBD will be a one stop 360 degree exposure to social business. For example India Forum will give the Indian delegates to review what is being done, what are in the pipeline and what can be done in India. Also, it will facilitate the delegates to communicate with each other to build up their joint initiatives.At the end of the forum discussion, we can have a plenary session to present all the concrete action plans and announcements emerging from the Forums.

This will help disseminate and cross-fertilize action programs

Fundamental objectives will be the following-

• Get to know each other from the same country more deeply, meet the people who are interested in social business, or already doing something in social business, planning to undertake a social business project, looking for a joint venture partner in a social business. Networking and community building leading to action will be the essence of the Forum.
• Review the existing social businesses in their area, and offer support to the existing social businesses to make it easy for them to move forward.
• Present social business plans, which are looking for investors.
• Local, national, international Investors will introduce themselves and explain how they can be involved in social businesses in the country.
• Policy makers, social activists, NGO leaders will try to understand how social businesses can be useful in achieving their objectives through social businesses in the country.
• Delegates will discuss the possibilities of creating social business villages, cities, districts, etc.
• Ultimately people attending the Forum will come up with follow-up programs and action plans. They can also come up with ideas how to make their Forum more effective next year. What kind of preparations they should make so that next year's Forum will attract more people who can make a big difference in making social business a significant part of the business and social world of the area.

A Forum will focus on one country only. For example, India Forum will be exclusively dedicated to India, organized by Indians for Indians and those who are involved in India. Another Forum will be on China, organized by the Chinese for the Chinese, and so on.

Each forum will have a title such as "SBD India Forum." or “SBD China Forum” Similarly we will have other Forums such as Japan Forum, Australia Forum, Latin America Forum, Middle East Forum, Africa Forum, Bangladesh Forum, Chittagong Forum, Maharashtra Forum, ASEAN Forum, EU Forum, U.S. Forum, Canada Forum, Central Asia Forum, MENA Forum.

How to Organize a Forum

A person or an organization may take the lead to organize the Forum and contact YC expressing this intention. Once YC goes through the due diligence about the proposal, it will work with the person/org what is the best way to proceed in organizing a successful Forum. More than one person can collectively approach the YC, and form a team of co-organizers.

Organizers will submit a tentative plan about the participants, possible speaker, focus of the Forum, what to expect from the Forum, etc. Initial plan will describe which sectors of the society will be approached. Organizers may designate a sector leader in each sector to work with the key persons and organizations within the sector. The following sectors may be approached:

• Social businesses.
• Business and industry
• Microfinance
• NGO
• Foundations
• Government agencies
• Government policy makers
• Universities. Business schools, Research organizations
• Media -- Social. Print. Electronic
• Youth organizations
• Women organizations
• Healthcare institutions
• Technology institutions
• Outstanding examples of social initiatives.
• Water and sanitation
• Forest.
• Agriculture.

Each sector leader will promote the concept of social business from the perspective of the sector. Immediate task would be to interest a group of persons to join SBD and one of them to speak at the Forum. Sector leader will identify the subject on which the speaker will speak. Sector leader will promote the Forum in Chambers of Commerce. Various business events. Publications. Business schools, consulting firms, associations. Rotary and other professional bodies.

What will be discussed at the Forum:

A tentative list of topics is given below. But each Forum has to develop its own topics and its own agenda. Forum must develop its own vision and purpose.

• Overview of present social business initiatives in the country and around. Who is doing what.
• Who are interested in social business.
• Why we think social business is a reliable path to solve our social problems in the specific country.
• Some social business plans
• We are investors/funders. We are looking for project to invest in.
• This is what we are planning to do.
• We would be happy to explore joint venture projects in social business.
• How to interest our business leaders to get involved with joint ventures.
• We are already members of social business Academia Network. This is what we do. We want to build up a bigger network in the country.

Forums should spend more time in presentation of Action Plans, announcements about projects, partnerships, investments, follow-up events in the country, rather than theoretical discussions.