Keynote Remarks

[Music] um but I do want to at the outset uh say a heartfelt thank you to the Atlantic Council because uh they have been tremendous Partners not just to our mission here in the UAE but uh really across the board around the world and uh they have been partners on some truly pivotal initiatives such as this one and I'll say a few words about that later but uh your excellencies ladies and gentlemen we do have a number of gentlemen in the audience which uh certainly is very critical when we're discussing this issue so I will say that I am um not just honored but uh thrilled to be joining you this afternoon uh to rec recognize and empower the next generation of women Trailblazers and you will get to hear a little bit about them later on but I think it's really fitting uh to do so here at the Abu Dhabi Finance week uh because uh this week of course we focused on what is driving the global economy what are some of the key trends that our policy makers should be thinking about but for me and for our mission uh it is also a week that caps a truly historic and momentous year in US UAE relations and uh over the past year our two countries have worked to strengthen our strategic partnership and really oriented towards success in the decades to come and uh I think all of you noticed that uh one of the core themes of the finance week this year was on the very rapidly evolving geopolitical and geoeconomic context in which we all operate and in which we all cooperate but also in which we all compete and success in this very Dynamic environment requires Partnerships and this is something that the United States is very much committed to and these Partnerships of course help countries navigate the complexities uh of this uh geopolitical and geoeconomic very fluid environment but also to help us mobilize our shared resources and Orient us towards the key opportunities but also challenges ahead and I would say uh the US UAE partnership is very much uh the perfect example of uh such a partnership that is required at this pivotal moment I think all of you uh know that in September we had the great pleasure and honor to Welcome to the United States His Highness shikh Muhammad and uh he had uh he was the first sitting UAE president to visit uh the White House and uh in his meeting with President Biden the two really uh came to a what I would say almost 100% alignment on some of the key opportunities ahead of us and the two leaders when they sat down together charted a very ambitious path for our bilateral partnership and in their joint statement I will just uh share with you a brief quote uh they said the United States and the United Arab Emirates are both entrepreneurial Nations joined together by a Relentless focus on the future our aspirations are rooted in a common resolve to pursue Innovative Partnerships in new Fields including AI food security infrastructure investment and supply chain resilience so together we our two countries are working together we're innovating and we're building the sectors that will be driving the 21st century economy and and as you just heard that includes Ai and Frontier technology of every sort space economy cyber security health and life sciences and of course sustainable reliable clean sources of energy to power all of these different sectors and efforts what is also required and this is something that has been a priority is ensuring that our two countries have a skilled we prepared Workforce to participate and Achieve success in this 21st century economy and therefore our bilateral priorities have very much included training education and women's empowerment and here is where I get to our cooperation with the Atlantic Council uh it has been absolutely uh one of our core priorities to empower women in finance and Entrepreneurship because that type of effort has demonstrated time and again that uh we can help unlock new opportunities create thriving businesses and as aelia mentioned create prosperity in our economies and societies we recognize that women's economic empowerment is not just nice to do it's not something that we should just talk about in conferences it is very much something that we must do and this is why we are supporting the Atlantic council's women innovator or win fellowships and this is in collaboration with georgetown's magana business school and uh I will tell you and I think I mentioned to some of you as I was walking in this is an initiative and a program that is very much near and dear to my heart uh because I was privileged to uh help launch this program in Saudi Arabia some three years ago and uh it was even better to watch it grow and succeed and has now expanded to not just UAE but also Bahrain and Jordan and it's programs such as wi that provide women entrepreneurs with the training the skills the capacity building uh digital and financial tools mentorship and uh resources in general that uh helped them um access uh you know stores of knowledge that they would otherwise not uh be able to reach and uh this is uh something again that uh we have found to be true time and again through programs such as when and since 2020 the state department has also supported a program called Academy for for women entrepreneurs or awe and this is again a program that has been incredibly successful here in the UAE and we are very proud of this collaboration with NYU Abu Dhabi and uh with start ad and we showcase these programs and others at a recent Summit this took place in September we brought together women entrepreneurs and alumna from 14 different countries across region and Central Asia and we took them to Abu Dhabi Shara and Dubai uh but more importantly we exposed them to all of the tools and resources and knowledge uh that we could share with them in uh the three days that they were with us and um most importantly I would say and this is something that we heard from all of the participants or most uh important to them uh were their ability to engage with uh prior alumni and alumni of our programs uh these were women that had graduated but really made the Journey of uh entrepreneurs toward success and they were so generous with their time and with their knowledge and really shared uh with our participants in this Summit everything that they could uh to help encourage them and help help support them in these initial stages of their efforts and uh I just want to highlight a few of these women that have as I said made the journey and Achieve success because they are really terrific we had uh with us win alumna Lara Hussein from Wast lab this is somebody who is an innovator and Visionary and uh her technology was profiled at cop 28 in Dubai last year we had us also a alumna Marcela Sancho the founder of House of pops and those of you who have not had her popsicles you should go out and get some because they're delicious and they are taking over the Middle East as Bloomberg recently wrote we also had with us our youngest Wing win alumna alabi almey some of you may have seen her profiled recently in media uh this young lady is just tremendous she's a Guinness World Book record holder and a youngest Emirate publisher another success story was from our inj training program it was an all female grade 12 student company called Limitless and they are working uh with aib based applications to help students with special needs and finally uh we had a alna hadil Alti uh founder of broth lab I think she's joining us today is she here no okay too bad because she's a really tremendous advocate for women entrepreneurs and Incredibly successful again somebody who started small but now is expanding not just to other countries in your region but also to the United States so these are a few of the women Trailblazers that uh we helped as I said in those initial stages they're Visionaries and we were so proud to work with them they are really just absolutely magnificent and we're looking to do much more with all of you we're looking always for great ideas so that we can expand the reach of our programs uh create new programs so please uh do stay in touch with us let us know how it's going in February for example we will be sponsoring uh during uae's Innovation month we will be sponsoring the first ever us Pavilion and at the charia entrepreneurship Festival we're really looking forward to that again just to engage with more uh sort of budding tycoons and uh entrepreneurs and helping them along the way so thank you very much for uh participating today and thank you for all that you are doing to help women entrepreneurs help women businesses and help the US UAE partnership which is built as always not by diplomats like me but by people like you who are working every single day to create the Partnerships relationships and friendships that drive forward this really historic relationship thank [Applause] [Music] youum good afternoon everyone should women be appointed to Executive management roles and boards are we good enough do quotas truly solve the problems of gender disparity or do they risk undermining the principle of meritocracy consistently studies show that diverse leadership teams deliver better financial performance Innovation and decision- making yet while significant progress has been made an increasing women presence in leadership across various Industries the finance sector remains a notable exception I still find it a bit masculine after so many years according to gender equality attitude study issued by the United Nation women there's still a persistent social bias and believe that women don't do Finance enough do you believe that I'm delighted we are here today to challenge that outdated notion and to ask what's holding us back there is significant gap between the policies designed by policy makers governments to promote women's representation on Executive corporate roles and the reality is on the ground while in s with no doubt are commendable the mechanisms needed to make these policies tangible are often lacking this includes challenges in training potential candidates identifying and nominating them for leadership roles and making them visible in the executive sphere to bridge this Gap we must acknowledge that women are competent and capable we are competent and capable of ascending to leadership roles based on meritocracy and net quas it's 2024 it's no longer 1995 so women bring adaptive leadership style excelling in navigating complex challenges with resilience empathy and Innovative problem solving Merit should always guide these decisions but creating the right environment for women to Showcase their abilities is essential to achieve this we must address critical barriers to women's advancement especially in the finance sector these include in my view in my humble view first tackling unconscious bias stereotypes and many other forms which are embedded within the organizational structure secondly actively promoting and sponsorship opportunities to provide women with the guidance and advocacy they need and thirdly creating more flexible and inclusive working environment to accommodate diverse needs and aspirations as a senior emarati executive I'm incredibly proud to be part of a nation that leads the way in supporting women empowerment ranked the first in the Mina region 30th globally by the world economic Forum the UA demonstrates its commitment to female leadership with women comprising 50% of the federal cabinet in UAE it's an Evidence it's it's an Evidence to its dedication to gender parity at the highest level I'm equally proud to be part of madala as an institution it's one of the leading investment Sovereign wealth funds of Abu Dhabi government where we Champion diversity and inclusion by actively advancing women's careers in traditionally male dominated sectors such as Euros space heavy Industries energy and many more for example emmer Global aluminium which is a joint venture between Abu zabi and Dubai governments broke barriers with women in key roles while strata for example another subsidary of mubadala that sits outside ABAB in uh working on Advanced material manufacturing Euros space and Aviation had broke a record it has 80% of their Workforce females I was astonished when I paid a visit to strata and is my hometown when I was born I was really exceptionally impressed with women not just only working behind desktops no really qualified Engineers technicians on the ground working with their own hands on day and night shifts so we can have the smoothest experience in um uh flying or an aircraft so well done for them really I was very impressed ma also is another example it's an enabler for energy transition and it has been empowering women to shape the future of renewable energy we also play a pivotal role in exporting talents to another UAE based entities esteemed leaders such as their excellencies saram selam n Ali suedi ja they all began their professional Journeys at mubadala these women have gun to make it to make significant contributions to the UAE development further showcasing mad's commitment to fostering female talent in the UAE I'm very optimistic not just about the future of women in finance but the future of all of us living in this fantastic beautiful safe uh forward-looking country with really uh blessed leadership to Believe in Us and to believe u in in in the future of this country and the world and the goodness of the world a positive shift is underway and I'm confident that this momentum will continue to grow mubadala is standing at the heart of the capital of the capital Abu Dhabi plays an important role in this progress Abu Dhabi with bold Ambitions create opportunities for women to lead future touristic sectors and emerging Trends such as artificial intelligence Advanced manufacturing Life Sciences energy transition and many more we don't only drive these sectors but we ensure that women are on the front line of its progress by equipping them to navigate black swans with high impact events that reshape Industries and societies women has been very empowered have been very empowered to um uh act with confidence and resilience and as an example of this mentioned earlier I've been serving I am privileged to be serving on mad's group of invest uh group investment committee where I contribute to critical decision making processes alongside other remarkable woman this reflects our decision and dedication to enabling women to excel at the highest levels of strategic influence the uae's model uh in women empowerment has became a blue Brint of success for Success inspiring foreign corporations to adopt it today many of these organizations are led by exceptional female leaders further proving the power of this imarati model and now if there is one message I hope to leave you with I would say women in the UAE had achieved so much and crossed so many miles then we then we must continue this this journey and let's work together to melt barriers and empower the next generation of female leaders thank you for your time and for your attention I hope today's discussion Inspire meaningful actions for all of us thank you again [Applause] [Music]