PM says businesses need to think beyond the bottom line

With the emergence of newer challenges, Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Sunday said that businesses need to think beyond the bottom line and this can be done through focusing on supply chain resiliency and sustainability.

“B20 should think on new issues. Businesses have successfully gone beyond borders and boundaries. Now it is time to take businesses just beyond the bottom line. This can only be done by focusing on supply chain resilient and sustainability,” he said at the valedictory session of the B20 or Business 20 Summit India 2023, organised by CII which is the B20 Secretariat.

“Connected work is not just about connecting technologically…it is also about our shared purpose, shared planet, shared prosperity and shared future,” he underlined.

Noting that a number of global business leaders are attending the B20 Summit, the Prime Minister said that there is a need for cooperation on a number of issues such as climate change, energy sector crisis, water crisis, food supply chain imbalance, cyber security that have a big impact on businesses. Further, newer issues such as cryptocurrency and Artificial Intelligence require an integrated approach by businesses and governments across the world.

He called for an integrated approach to the challenge of cryptocurrency, where a global framework is needed and where all stakeholders are kept in mind. A similar approach needs to be followed for AI, he said highlighting ethical considerations regarding skilling and re-skilling, and concerns regarding algorithm bias and its impact on society and global business communities and governments have to ensure that ethical AI expands, he said.

“This is not the first time such challenges have come up. When aviation and financial sector were expanding, then also the world has found such frameworks. So I request the B20 to look at new issues,” the Prime Minister said.

He also highlighted that the future of global growth is dependent on the future of business.  We all know business can transform potential into prosperity, obstacles into opportunities, and aspirations into achievements. Whether they are small or big, global or big, business can ensure progress for everyone. Therefore, the future of global growth is dependent on the future of global business,” he said.

Highlighting opportunities presented by India, he said India has become the face of a digital revolution in the era of Industry 4.0. With the pandemic bringing irreversible changes in the global supply chain, he further noted that India holds an important role in setting up an efficient and trusted global supply chain.  

The Prime Minister also stressed on the importance of sustainability and said discussions should not be limited to rules and regulations but should be a part of daily life. He urged global businesses to move a step ahead. “Sustainability is an opportunity and a business model in itself,” he stressed, while giving the example of millets.

He also emphasised on adapting life and business according to the environment and informed about India preparing a framework of green credit for business, which emphasises on planet-positive actions and urged all the global business leaders business to join hands and make it a global movement.

He also stressed that businesses should focus on improving the purchasing power of more and more people as a self-centric approach will harm everyone. The Prime Minister underlined that a profitable market can be sustained when there is a balance in the interests of producers and consumers, and it also applies to nations. He stressed that treating other countries only as a market will not work but harm even the producing countries sooner or later.  

The Prime Minister also urged businesses to come together for the good of consumers and markets and said businesses should consider celebrating an International Consumer Care Day rather than a Consumer Rights Day. “Once we start celebrating Consumer Care Day, then the issues relating to rights will be solved on their own,” he said. He elaborated that consumers are not confined to retail consumers within a particular geography but also the nations that are consumers of global trade, global goods and services.

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