"I am optimistic about the future. The question is if the economic growth of India and China will slow down if the global economy slows. I don't think the impact on China will be very big." Wang Jianzhou, Chairman and Chief Executive, China Mobile Communications Corporation, People's Republic of China

Participants in the World Economic Forum Annual Meeting 2008 focused on the tools for addressing the many challenges emerging as a result of the shifting power equations in the world. The Power of Collaborative Innovation is arguably the last remedy to the stresses of intense globalization that have been evident in financial market volatility, widening income disparities, and in conflict zones around the world. As former British Prime Minister Tony Blair observed in the closing plenary session: "Globalization is forcing changes in how people collaborate in a fundamental way." Blair added: "If we are interconnected and the world is interconnected, the only way for the world to work is to have a set of common values. We have no option but to work together".

Collaborative innovation is far from the norm in international affairs, not least because the structures of global governance have not evolved for nearly three generations. Nation states, even those working closely together, will not be able to address future global challenges if business and civil society are not engaged at the outset. In the current context, the World Economic Forum provides a unique platform for multiple stakeholders to address a range of global, regional and industry issues. Fostering collaborative innovation becomes all the more critical in a time of heightened uncertainty.

Among the outcomes of the Annual Meeting:
•	Japanese Prime Minister Yasuo Fukuda unveiled a five-year, US$ 10 billion fund to support efforts in developing countries to combat global warming - a move to ensure that top priority is given to climate change at this year's G8 Summit in Hokkaido. In addition, Japan aims to create a new multilateral fund with the US and the United Kingdom to mitigate changes in the earth's climate as a result of global warming.
•	The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation announced a US$ 306 million package of agricultural development grants "designed to boost the yields and incomes of millions of small farmers in Africa and other parts of the developing world so they can lift themselves and their families out of hunger and poverty".
•	The World Economic Forum, Forum Member companies and the United Nations launched initiatives to facilitate broader and deeper private sector support of humanitarian relief operations. Among the programmes established: Agility, TNT and UPS, three leading logistics and transport companies, are joining forces to help the humanitarian sector with emergency response to large-scale natural disasters.

The Annual Meeting agenda was organized under five sub-themes - Economics and Finance: Addressing Economic Insecurity; Geopolitics: Aligning Interests Across Divides; Business: Competing While Collaborating; Science and Technology: Exploring Nature's New Frontiers; and Values and Society: Understanding Future Shifts.

World Economic Forum Reaches Millions with the Davos Conversation

Ahead of the Annual Meeting, the World Economic Forum created the first-ever global video conversation between the general public and the world leaders who were participating in Davos. By the last day of the Meeting, the Forum reached a worldwide audience of over 7 million with the Davos Question on YouTube. In the run-up to the Annual Meeting the Forum had asked the Davos Question: "What one thing do you think countries, companies or individuals must do to make the world a better place in 2008?" Nearly 300 people, including some of the Forum's Members, sent in personal video replies. The best were shown during the opening and other selected plenary sessions at the Annual Meeting 2008. The topics most often included development, economics, education, environment, climate change, energy, water, governance, human rights, values and technology innovations. You can check out the best replies on the following website: www.youtube.com/profile_favorites?user=thedavosquestion. In Davos, the Forum set up a special Davos Conversation corner where all participants were encouraged to reply to these videos uploaded by the YouTube users, or to simply answer the Davos Question. Over 110 participants, including President Shimon Peres of Israel, President Abdoulaye Wade of Senegal, President Hamid Karzai of Afghanistan, musician Bono and actress Emma Thompson along with numerous business leaders used the special video corner to record their messages. Watch the best responses here: www.youtube.com/view_play_list?p=749732FFD312CA7F. "The Davos Question and the Davos Conversation video corner were the embodiment of our Annual Meeting theme: 'The Power of Collaborative Innovation'," said Klaus Schwab, Founder and Executive Chairman of the World Economic Forum. The Forum is currently planning to continue the video conversation with YouTube at some of its regional meetings.

"There is no time to lose in addressing climate change. We have a readily available means of taking action without waiting for the agreement on a post-Kyoto framework. It goes without saying that aiming at the most efficient use of energy is now an obligation upon humanity". Yasuo Fukuda, Prime Minister of Japan

Economics and Finance: Addressing Economic Insecurity
The unfolding financial crisis should be viewed as a chapter in a much larger, more profound story - the rebalancing of global wealth away from the West and toward the emerging economies of Asia and the Middle East.

•	The shift of economic power from West to East is an epochal transformation that is taking place faster than anticipated.
•	The challenge to policy-makers and businesspeople is how to address the more dangerous side effects of global growth such as widening income disparities, inflation and environmental degradation.
•	The decoupling of global growth from the US economy is premature, but there is a new dynamic with the rapid growth of China and other emerging economies shortening and softening the US downturn.
•	Charting a more equitable and sustainable course for global growth will require long-term investments in human capital, education, health and environmental protection.
•	Greater coordination of macroeconomic policy, beyond just the G8, is needed given the limits of traditional monetary and fiscal policy in a global economy.

Geopolitics: Aligning Interests Across Divides Collaborative innovation is the framework to address major global challenges linked to the intensification of globalization.
•	The legacy institutions of global governance are not capable of tackling the many interconnected and complex challenges of a multipolar world.
•	Collaboration among nation states is not sufficient to address pressing global problems. The participation of business and civil society is needed.
•	Climate change is an immediate test of whether a new brand of collaborative and pragmatic leadership can lead to real and lasting results.
•	The world is in transition. The US is too strong to stand on the sidelines, but too weak to go it alone. The state is no longer the most important point of reference for many populations.
•	There are global challenges that simply require greater collaboration such as the Doha Round of Trade negotiations and the Middle East peace process. And there are those that will require greater innovation to solve such as rapidly ageing societies, urbanization and food security. But the most pressing challenges for humankind, such as climate change, terrorism and non-proliferation will require both collaboration and innovation.

Business: Competing While Collaborating To survive and prosper in the rapidly evolving global marketplace, companies must win the war for talent and innovate rapidly but also, where appropriate, collaborate - even with the competition.
•	As worldwide markets reward swift and agile companies, mobile technology has become a powerful tool for empowering consumers and connecting customers and clients with product and service providers.
•	In addition to shifts in technology, the global business climate continues to be profoundly affected by shifts in power from developed economies to emerging markets including Brazil, Russia, India and China, which are spawning multinational companies of their own that are effectively competing against established corporations from the West.
•	Globalization is decentralizing power, while demographic differentials are heightening the fight for talent.
•	Web collaboration is distributive; open source results in robustness but not innovation. How to innovate is less complicated than discovering what to innovate.
•	The practice of corporate global citizenship is crucial for a company to succeed in this context.

Science and Technology: Exploring Nature's New Frontiers
Science and technology are progressing so fast that advances are challenging our assumptions about the human experience. While death remains inevitable, when and how it happens is now less of a mystery.

•	Deeper understanding of the essence of our individuality, DNA, may help us to be more in control of our health and lifespan. Meanwhile, the finality of paralysis is being challenged by developments in neurotechnology and regenerative medicine. In addition, advances in genetics are providing new weapons against cancer.
•	These developments are changing the rules of the labour force, the calculus of healthcare and our concepts of age, equality and privacy.
•	Highly bespoke diagnosis and treatment is challenging the traditional assumption that each person needs, and is entitled to, a common slate of medical procedures. However, patients and doctors fear that people with a genetic disposition to disease will face discrimination and that employers or insurers might reject them.
•	While science may decrease our mortality, the total cost of healthcare will rise.
•	Businesses are fundamentally altering the way in which they conduct research. They are increasingly relying on collaborative research rather than large-scale integrated research that invents a new technology from top to bottom.

Values and Society: Understanding Future Shifts
Globalization's impact on cultures, societies and values must be the subject of deeper, more qualitative analysis. Increasing interconnectedness has not always led to secularization or homogenization. Often, in fact, it has exacerbated divisions.

•	The growth of economic opportunity as a result of globalization must be combined with a sense of values centred on the notions of justice and freedom to ensure its sustainability over the long run.
•	Burgeoning urban populations place enormous strains on existing infrastructure, particularly in Asia and Latin America. Urbanization must be made sustainable.
•	While consuming less is a difficult message in much of the world, developing market consumers have the economic motivation to "get more for less" which promotes demand for energy-efficient products.
•	It is not necessarily faith that brings people into conflict but rather politics and the pursuit of economic and military power, as well as the manipulation of ideology, whether religious or secular.
•	To foster cross-cultural understanding, public and private learning institutions must work to promote empathy. The Internet can play a critical role in education to bridge divides.

The Forum would like to thank the distinguished Co-Chairs of the Annual Meeting 2008, who led many sessions and provided valuable insights and wisdom. They were:
Tony Blair, Prime Minister of the United Kingdom (1997-2007); Member of the Foundation Board of the World Economic Forum
James Dimon, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, JPMorgan Chase & Co., USA
K. V. Kamath, Managing Director and Chief Executive Officer, ICICI Bank, India
Henry A. Kissinger, Chairman, Kissinger Associates, USA
Indra K. Nooyi, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, PepsiCo, USA
David J. O'Reilly, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, Chevron, USA
Wang Jianzhou, Chairman and Chief Executive, China Mobile Communications Corporation, People's Republic of China

"In spite of the economic crisis, can we look beyond that and view Davos as a collection of minds to address issues that can be addressed? My hope is that we are here not only with a can-do spirit, but with a must-do spirit."
Indra K. Nooyi, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, PepsiCo, USA

"Globalization is forcing changes in how people collaborate in a fundamental way. You need stronger and stronger collaborative political leadership. If we are interconnected and the world is interconnected, the only way for the world to work is to have a set of common values. We have no option but to work together."
Tony Blair, Prime Minister of the United Kingdom (1997-2007); Member of the Foundation Board of the World Economic Forum

"This is not a great year in the US for far-sighted and imaginative economic policies. We need to activate world trade talks and strengthen the global international system."
Henry A. Kissinger, Chairman, Kissinger Associates, USA