GIFT Founder and CEO, Chandran Nair was invited to speak at an event organised by the Asia Business Committee of the American Chamber of Commerce on 3rd July 2008 in Tokyo. Mr. Nair’s talk focused on reconciling the unprecedented economic development that has resulted from globalisation with the issue of sustainability.

In discussing sustainable development issues Mr. Nair acknowledged that various public, NGO and private sector "green" initiatives of today are a good start to tackling the problem, but, geo-political issues and the current trends of globalisation have created further stresses that remain inadequately addressed. Mr. Nair raised questions about the effectiveness of market-based solutions in mitigating these stresses, and what roles companies need to adopt to be on the side of the solution rather than the problem.

The event was attended by executives from a wide variety of multinational companies as well local Japanese firms.