Charity Auction At Global Citizen Forum Raises More Than US$400,000 To Help Rebuild Barbuda

SVETI STEFAN, Montenegro - Three hundred participants at this year’s Global Citizen Forum in Sveti Stefan, Montenegro, heard from panelists exploring the vital role of citizenship, leadership, global security challenges, and philanthropy, as well as practicing that philanthropy by raising over US$400,000 to help rebuild the Caribbean island of Barbuda, which was devastated last month by Hurricane Irma.

Wrapping up the Forum, founder of the Global Citizen Forum and Global Citizen Foundation, Armand Arton, said: “We have gathered some of the greatest minds on the planet and examined some of the world’s biggest problems. We will now be looking ahead to how we can all make a significant and positive difference. Thanks to the generosity of our participants and sponsors we raised over US$400,000 to help rebuild Barbuda, and US$50,000 to support women entrepreneurs in the Middle East. This forum goes from strength to strength thanks to the dedication and commitment of all involved.”

Earlier during the forum thinkers, experts, professionals, and world leaders joined together to explore innovative solutions to problems facing the world.

Speakers included Dusko Markovic, prime minister of Montenegro; Gaston Browne, prime minister of Antigua and Barbuda; Cherie Blair; Jeannette Kagame, First Lady of Rwanda; musical superstars Akon and Wyclef Jean, Nouriel Roubini and Jose Manuel Baroso, the former president of the European Union, among others.

The Global Citizen Award 2017 was given to Akon for his solar power initiative Lighting Africa and other tireless work as a global citizen.

Browne spoke on Hurricane Irma, climate change, and impact on his country: “Climate change is real and we are living the consequences. On an annual basis we are seeing more powerful storms. Hurricanes respect no borders… My plea to you is to support our rebuilding effort… let us work together for a better world.”

Robert De Niro, actor, philanthropist and special economic envoy for Antigua and Barbuda, who is developing a tourism project on the island of Barbuda, said, “We are stronger united than divided. Now is the time to help us recover and rebuild.”

Julia Onslow-Cole of PwC discussed the positive impact of immigration: “There’s a lot of misinformation out there, PwC recently carried out an analysis of the benefits of migration to London, and after taking out contributions for the health service and so on, the net contribution of every migrant is £46,000. With 1.8 million migrants in London that’s a net benefit of £83 billion.”