Interview: St. Gallen Symposium CEO encourages more dialogue with China on pressing global issues

ST. GALLEN, Switzerland, May 7 (Xinhua) -- Chief executive officer (CEO) of the St. Gallen Symposium, a leading student-driven organization and platform for cross-generational dialogue and collaboration, Beat Ulrich, highlighted the need for more dialogue with China to tackle pressing global issues.

"Dialogue is necessary. Dialogue is very, very valuable for both sides," Ulrich told Xinhua in a recent interview. "It's about understanding and then finding a way forward together. The issues we discuss here are global issues. They're not just a European issue or a Chinese issue."

The 53rd St. Gallen Symposium in Switzerland took place on May 2-3 under this year's topic of "Confronting Scarcity."

"It's a global topic and issue, and therefore, I'm happy about the continued participation from China," said the CEO.

This year's event featured 1,200 participants from the fields of business, politics, academia, and civil society aiming at fostering the dialogue between generations, and more than 100 speakers, 200 young talents known as "leaders of tomorrow," and 500 student volunteers.

The entire conference was organized by the International Students' Committee and took place at the University of St. Gallen, one of Europe's top business schools.

"If we continue in this way, the world will run into several scarcities. We must find better ways to deal with the challenges, whether it's about changing the business or societal models," Ulrich said.

Challenges range from energy shortages in Europe and rising food insecurities across Africa and the Middle East to disrupted supply chains and the resurgence of domestic manufacturing, he explained.

Businesses, governments and individuals are increasingly confronted with the reality of shrinking workforces, trade disruptions, higher costs of capital and depleted natural resources, he said.

"This multidimensional phenomenon of scarcity is here to stay and requires us to rethink our current societal and economic models," he said.

"The cross-generational dialogue is at the core of our DNA," he said, noting that during the pandemic the younger generation could not travel and was unable to meet with the older generations. "We need to find solutions together, that's the only way forward."