Journey in the world of entrepreneurship.
Coming from Three generations of Real estate development family background, I was groomed to take care of the Hospitality vertical. After high school, I was sent to study hospitality in India, Switzerland and the UK while I worked across the hospitality sector in the UK, USA and India. The idea was to learn a finer aspect of the Tourism and hospitality industry.
I always believed the fastest and best way to develop a country is through Tourism Development. It brings employment for unskilled to highly skilled manpower and creates a whole ecosystem for overall development.
“Tourism brings people and people bring business and culture which creates economic growth.”
After my short stint as a professional in the industry, I moved to UAE in 2007 to explore opportunities for my newly established business of Tourism and hospitality consultancy as I felt the region and UAE, in particular, was buzzing with such development. One thing led to the other and I began assignments with high-level royal family-owned projects in Abu Dhabi. The projects were well executed and through hard work and swift acclimatisation, I was able to assume higher responsibilities where I was asked to manage the hospitality portfolio to overall portfolio which led to my rise in the hierarchy. Since then, I moved on to working with partners across sectors for business under the patronage of the Royal family of Abu Dhabi. The focus has always been social entrepreneurship. All that I do has an angle of community development. It revolves around sustainability and ESG. I believe the world is in dire need of sustainable and equitable distribution of resources for a better future for our children. Through sustainable development, we can achieve long term positive peace. That’s also the vision with which I am driving initiatives at United Nations University for Peace established the Commission for peace where we focus on peace innovation initiatives.
Q: Share with us the initial experiences you have had in the business world? How has it helped you grow?
With a huge legacy behind you of your Family, it wasn’t easy to venture out on my own to create a niche In a highly competitive marketplace. compromising on quality and family name was never an option. The major challenge was to identify right from wrong, good from bad. Most businesses I worked upon were all futuristic and hence creating a niche and understanding within my team and the marketplace was very challenging.
With this in mind, I always had to struggle and choose a tougher path which led to slow but steady progress. As they say, when you have an open mind, ideas and people will come to you with prospects which leads to success. I have always enjoyed great relationships within royal family offices in Abu Dhabi and business groups in India and USA. This was enough to create partnerships and forge alliances for long term vision.
Q: How do you think the pandemic has impacted your businesses as a whole? What prospects do you see post-2021?
There’s been a very positive impact as most of our businesses are tech-focused and long term sustainable projects in sectors like Tourism and Hospitality Development, IT and tech park Development, Agriculture and sustainable mining projects. We don’t see any issues with our long term projects while our IT and tech-enabled service delivery Businesses ensured we were never cash-starved. A little bit of pain in traditional sectors of trading and oil and gas was offset with a recent correction. So overall, we’ve been fortunate enough to have zero negative impact.
For the future, Long term sustainable development projects strictly complying with ESG norms will surely be a winner. We’re all focused on that.
Q: Tell us how technologies like artificial intelligence and virtual reality are helping companies in times like these?
Digital adoption has taken a quantum leap at both the organisational and industry levels
During the pandemic, consumers have moved dramatically toward online channels, and companies and industries have responded in turn. There’s a rapid shift toward interacting with customers through digital channels.
In just a few months, the COVID-19 crisis has brought about years of change in the way companies in all sectors and regions do business. companies have stood up at least temporary solutions to meet many of the new demands on them, and much more quickly than they had thought possible before the crisis. Businesses are looking at a paradigm shift as most of these changes will enable a long-lasting impact on business processes and they’re already making the kinds of investments that all but ensure they will stick. In fact, about the impact of the crisis on a range of measures, funding for digital initiatives has increased more than anything else—more than increases in costs, the number of people in technology roles, and the number of customers.
To stay competitive in this new business and economic environment requires new strategies and practices.
Q: You have been associated with various Social entrepreneurship projects in the past. Share with us the one which is close to your heart.
This is a very difficult choice to make. All the work done towards social empowerment is very close to my heart. We’re sector agnostic. We focus wherever there is an opportunity for impact. One example is we bought a small stake in an organic fertiliser company that helps solve farmland deterioration. The soil is losing its nutrient value with the constant use of inorganic fertilisers and creating very low output from the farmland. Some farmers are even committing suicide because they’re not able to pay expenses, especially in India and Africa. Another example is that we went into areas where women were forced into marriage because they were considered “unproductive” members of the household. We said, “Okay if you believe that 50% of the population is ‘unproductive,’ why not offer them skill-development opportunities?” Last year around Christmas during a peak in the pandemic, we went into villages and taught women how to make candles and chocolates. I mean it sounds naive and simple but we had 7000 women enrol in just two days in a very remote part of India. And then we were able to approach companies and say, “Instead of buying from big brands, why don’t you give us a chance and purchase from these women?” We were able to offer these women a way to serve their families with dignity.
Another one is focused on preventive Healthcare which focuses on treating each human body differently as it varies from person to person. In current times, healthcare is the prime focus while preventive healthcare through holistic methods is on the rise.
Q: What is the impact of COVID 19 on the global economy? Resurgence is possible in how many months. What should you recommend we do globally or nationally for its fast resurgence?
The COVID-19 crisis is plunging the global economy into a deep recession and micro, small and medium enterprises – which play a major role in emerging economies – are amongst the hardest hit.
With more than two-thirds of the global population employed by MSMEs, the unprecedented outbreak of COVID 19 has shown how tightly their activities are woven into the economic and social fabric of the world and therefore how fundamental their role is in social and economic resurgence. The current crisis threatens to push back the limited gains made on gender equality and exacerbate the feminisation of poverty, vulnerability to violence, and women’s equal participation in the labour force. The project approach is built on the notion that nobody should be left behind.
The majority of micro, small and medium enterprises (MSMEs) in developing countries remain informal, operating without access to many government-supported COVID-19 benefits. Most are led by the working poor, women, youth, and other marginalized and vulnerable groups at risk of falling into poverty and falling further behind, making it imperative that MSMEs are included in the post-COVID-19 economic recovery.
Increased uptake of renewables, energy efficiency and related energy-transition measures represent far-sighted investment amid the crisis set off by the COVID-19 pandemic. As part of short-term stimulus and recovery plans, the energy transition provides a crucial link to medium- and long-term global climate and sustainability goals.
Q: Which sectors are more affected by the Coronavirus economically in the developed economy like Saudi Arabia? How fast can revival be possible?
Saudi Arabia, like any other developed country, has been hit by a reduction in exports and the worst-hit sector is the Oil and Gas and SME sector. Oil has been on the rebound since the early signs of recovery due to some control over the virus spread or we can say we’re better equipped than before to deal with this monster virus mutating in Different forms.
Initiatives introduced by Saudi Arabia’s development funds were aimed to mitigate any financial and economic impacts that the private sector experienced during the COVID-19 pandemic, and will provide support in various ways.
Extending the grace period and rescheduling loans for companies struggling with loans and payments amounting to more than SAR 6 billion
Providing SAR 1 billion worth of direct and indirect loans to finance working capital
Allocating SAR 4 billion to provide employment support and training programs that will allow more than 300,000 beneficiaries to work in the private sector
SAR 1 billion going to help private-sector employees who have not previously benefited from the support programs available
Allocation of SAR 4 billion to provide social loans to low-income families during 2020, with 100,000 Saudi citizens set to benefit.
Increasing the direct lending portfolio for micro and small enterprises to SAR 2 billion, set to help 6,000 male and female entrepreneurs
Allocation of a portfolio worth SAR 2 billion to provide financing support to small- and medium-sized health facilities, with 1,000 existing health facilities benefitting from the funds
Allocation of SAR 2 billion to finance indirect lending programs through financial institutions.
Q: Corona impacts the life and behaviour of the people. Will it change the world socially and economically?
We are facing a global health crisis unlike any in the 75-year history of the United Nations — one that is killing people, spreading human suffering, and upending people’s lives. But this is much more than a health crisis. It is a human, economic and social crisis. The coronavirus disease (COVID-19), which has been characterised as a pandemic by the World Health Organisation (WHO), is attacking societies at their core.
The COVID-19 outbreak affects all segments of the population and is particularly detrimental to members of those social groups in the most vulnerable situations, continues to affect populations, including people living in poverty situations, older persons, persons with disabilities, youth, and indigenous peoples. Early evidence indicates that the health and economic impacts of the virus are being borne disproportionately by poor people. For example, homeless people, because they may be unable to safely shelter in place, are highly exposed to the danger of the virus. People without access to running water, refugees, migrants, or displaced persons also stand to suffer disproportionately both from the pandemic and its aftermath – whether due to limited movement, fewer employment opportunities, increased xenophobia etc.
If not properly addressed through policy the social crisis created by the COVID-19 pandemic may also increase inequality, exclusion, discrimination and global unemployment in the medium and long term. Comprehensive, universal social protection systems, when in place, play a much more durable role in protecting workers and in reducing the prevalence of poverty, since they act as automatic stabilisers. That is, they provide basic income security at all times, thereby enhancing people’s capacity to manage and overcome shocks.
“We must come to the aid of the ultra-vulnerable – millions upon millions of people who are least able to protect themselves. This is a matter of basic human solidarity. It is also crucial for combating the virus. This is the moment to step up for the vulnerable.”
Q: You are into incubation & promoting young talent & ideas. Lots of youth look up to you as role models.Any message to them to deal with COVID19 situation now?
We believe Sustainability is key to the Development of our youth and their future depends a lot on what we do today. Human wants are limited while means to satisfy them are limited. My role at the UN Commission for Peace revolves around the prime focus of establishing long term peace through sustainability. Our initiative “The Peace Innovation Initiative (PII)” is built to create a global culture of peace through peace-inspired innovation. In partnership with the UN University for Peace, the only University established by the United Nations General Assembly founded in 1980, PII is building an ecosystem for sustainable peace-building by bringing all society sectors together and harnessing their relative strengths and insights to innovate for change.
PII envisions a world where our global systems are built upon a foundational framework for sustainable, positive peace. To create such a world, PII will: invest in original, collaborative research on peace & technology; build a digital peace education platform; design & build peace innovation projects and products; create commercialisation opportunities for peace innovations; engage in high-level media campaigns and public talks; and build and offer training and consultation to the private sector and interested institutions on peace, peace innovation and integration of the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).
PII will operate in a self-sustaining manner, where PII’s outputs support its infrastructure, in a circular model. In this way, PII values peace as a practice and believes such circular systems are the most effective way to create positive change and achieve the SDGs.
Q: Which leisure activities do you like to indulge in when not working.
My hobbies are Singing and writing. I am an artist at heart. Anything and any form of art are the refreshing and best form of rejuvenation for me.
