Securing Our Economic Prosperity – Obama’s advisor to speak at BDA Conference

On the 23rd of November, participants at the Brussels Diplomatic Academy conference on Securing Our Prosperity, will hear from former economic advisor to US President Barack Obama – Professor Steve Glickman of Georgetown University.

Ms. Anick Van Calster, Director General for Bilateral Affairs at Belgian Foreign Affairs and Prof. Dr. Emmanuel Dhyne of the National Bank of Belgium will join Professor Glickman in setting the context for this one-day event at which participants will identify the challenges faced, consider existing economic resilience, address the potential threats of digitalisation and robotization, and start to map out a way forward for Belgium.  

With panels on International Challenges for the Belgian Economy: Brexit, Trump and China; Are Digitalisation and Robotisation Threatening Belgium’s Welfare?; Belgium: An Attractive and Futureproof Country?; and The Way Forward: Strategies to Secure Our Prosperity and speakers from the public and private sectors, as well as the trades unions and academia, this conference provides an ideal cross-section of expertise to ensure informed and lively discussion on this essential issue for our future.

Contributing to that cross-section of expertise will be Prof. Dr. Caroline Pauwels, Rector of the VUB, and Olivier Joris, Executive Manager VBO who will both address the conference plenary.

The confirmed panellists include Gilles Suply, Policy Officer EU & International Affairs, Voka, Klaas de Vries, Associate Economist, The Conference Board, Mathieu Maes, Secretary General, ICC Belgium, Bruno Segers, Chairman of the Board of Flanders Investment and Trade, Koen De Leus, Chief Economist, BNP Paribas Fortis, Luis Colunga, Deputy General Secretary, IndustriAll, Stijn Decock, Chief Economist Knowledge Center, Voka, Tristan Dhondt, Partner, EY (Ernst & Young), Marcel Claes, CEO Amcham, Peter Demuynck, Director General, Agoria Vlaanderen, Hans Maertens, CEO Voka, Claire Tillekaerts, CEO Flanders Investment and Trade, Ivan Van de Cloot, Chief Economist, Itinera.

The event will take place at De Warande in Brussels, on the 23rd of November. For further information about the programme and availability of places please email delia.barbu@vub.be.