Trash, Trash, and More Trash. What to do with the Trash - Circular Economy

Trash, Trash, and More Trash. What to do with the Trash - Circular Economy Solutions

Date: Mon Jul 03 2023

Time: 18:00:00 GMT+0200 (Central European Summer Time)

Location: 93 Viaduktstrasse, 8005 Zürich

The Joint Alumni Forum in collaboration with Harvard Founders Talks would like to invite you to an event which will shed light on the importance of adopting a circular economy and how plastic waste and trash fits into the picture. We will discover how individuals passionate about these topics developed internationally recognized solutions to plastic waste and how you too can make a difference.

The evening will commence with an introduction to Circular Economy by subject matter expert Dr. Günther Dobrauz (PwC legal Switzerland), followed by presentations with Circular Economy legends, (i) David Katz (Plastic Bank), who will discuss his success in building a for-profit social enterprise with 31,918 community members, 3,872,900,726 bottles stopped and 576 recycling communities and (ii) Roman Peter (Trash Hero World) who will discuss how he mobilized a volunteer network with 466,587 volunteers, collecting 80 million kilograms of plastic -- the equivalent of 4 billion plastic bottles. The speakers will then be interviewed by Vvivi Hu (Harvard Business School) about how they managed to make successful enterprises out of waste and what they do with it. Diane Bailey (Harvard Kennedy School) will moderate. Q&A and networking apero will follow.

For Virtual Participants, see Teams Meeting link below (log in at 6pm CEST)

https://teams.microsoft.com/dl/launcher/launcher.html?url=%2F_%23%2Fl%2Fmeetup-join%2F19%3Ameeting_YjA3YzUxZjgtMDhhMC00MThlLThlNGMtODY4YzdhMWFiMzlm%40thread.v2%2F0%3Fcontext%3D%257b%2522Tid%2522%253a%252257bbf665-0de8-4655-890a-fc36e3f3bcd7%2522%252c%2522Oid%2522%253a%25227dcef73a-7702-4334-9c3f-7600c3d05a8e%2522%257d%26anon%3Dtrue&type=meetup-join&deeplinkId=9ea99347-507e-45ad-afc2-ffd1c4167e00&directDl=true&msLaunch=true&enableMobilePage=true&suppressPrompt=true

Dr. Günther Dobrauz is a Partner with PwC in Zurich and Leader of PwC Legal Switzerland where he also heads the Legal FS Regulatory & Compliance Services practise. He is a member of PwC’s Global Legal Leadership Team directing the firm’s global legal practise in 90+ countries. He believes that Circular Economy and Decentralization are key for our future!

Günther specialises in structuring, authorization and ongoing lifecycle management of financial intermediaries and their products. His passion as a practicing tech-enthusiast since 2002 is innovation linked to Exponential Technologies with a particular focus on achieving decentralization and he has also been working to promote real sustainability since 2010 where he advocates a systemwide change towards a circular economy.

Günter is the author of several books on innovation and disruption and also of ones on European, Swiss and Liechtenstein regulation. He also authored and co-authored 100+ publications in international expert magazines and has to date been speaking at more than 200 conferences worldwide.

Günther is passionate about Circular Economy and believes it will be a determinate for our future.

David Katz

An ambassador of Social Recycling by purpose, David is the Founder and Chairman of Plastic Bank - an internationally recognized solution to ocean plastic. His idea has enlivened an opportunity for the world to collect and exchange plastic as a currency. Today, his social enterprise is a global network of over 500 collection communities with more than 36,000 members transcending poverty by saving the ocean from plastic. David’s leadership has helped guide global partners like SC Johnson, Henkel, and more to stop billions of plastic bottles before they reach the ocean.

David has been named one of the world’s most compassionate entrepreneurs. He is the recipient of the United Nations Lighthouse Award for Planetary Health, recipient of the Paris Climate Conference Sustainia Community Award, recipient of the Ernst & Young Lifetime Achievement Award, recipient of The Globe and Mail: Report on Business Magazine’s Changemakers Award, and named the Entrepreneur Organizations, Global Citizen.

His humanitarian work has earned him international recognition. David has been featured in hundreds of international news and investigative articles, including BBC, CNN, Time Magazine, Forbes, Fast Company, Business Week, and National Geographic. David can be found at TED.com, is featured in award-winning documentaries, and starred in an international reality television show.

David is a steward of the earth and a champion for the poor.

Roman Peter is Co-Founder/Managing Director of Trash Hero World. Roman was born in Switzerland, is 39 years old, and holds a bachelor’s degree in computer science (2006). He worked formerly in the function of Senior IT Security Engineer, before leaving to travel around the world in 2012. Roman co-founded the Trash Hero Movement in 2013 with local friends in Thailand and has worked full-time to support, develop and expand the organization without being compensated since its beginning.

Trash Hero is a global volunteer movement, led by Trash Hero World which serves as the governing body for the global network of chapters and country organizations and supports the movement both financially and structurally. It is a non-profit association, registered in Switzerland At its heart is a growing grassroots network of chapters: unincorporated, community-based organizations, that run the programs. Each is affiliated with Trash Hero World and their national Trash Hero organization, if one exists. In countries with a significant number of chapters, Trash Heros have begun registering country-level organizations, in order to facilitate program coordination and represent local voices both on the national stage and within the movement.

Currently, the network extends to 17 countries around the world: Indonesia, Thailand, Malaysia, Myanmar, Singapore, Czech Republic, Romania, Serbia, Slovakia, Switzerland, Poland, Holland, Georgia, Germany, USA, Australia, Japan.

Rongrong Hu (Vvivi), a Chinese national residing in Switzerland, is an investor focusing on the technology and real estate sector and a managing partner of p&p Investment Management. She is a board member of the Harvard Club of Switzerland (HCCH) and founder of the HCCH Founders Talks. She is a non-executive Board of Director of People & Places AG, an asset holding company in Switzerland, as well as the Zur Rose Group, a Swiss-listed online pharmacy, and healthcare ecosystem builder with a leading position in Europe. She is also a member of the Swiss Institute of Directors.

Previously Vvivi worked for eBay as Senior Director of Innovation, M&A & Business Development EMEA and Chief Strategy Officer Greater China, managing strategy, product, data analytics, and marketing. Before that, she worked for McKinsey, CITIC Capital, and was the founder of various businesses, including an omni-channel e-Commerce business and advisory business enabling large corporations to incubate innovative business models.

Vvivi holds an MBA from Harvard Business School and a dual bachelor’s degree with honors in Telecommunication Engineering and International Economics & Trading from Shanghai JiaoTong University. She also has a board education program from a joint effort of the Swiss Board School and the University of St. Gallen.

Diane Bailey, a British citizen residing in Switzerland, is a Social Responsibility Advocate, 22 years UK qualified transactional lawyer with expertise in the banking & finance industry and blockchain & cryptocurrency. She is a subject matter expert in cross-border, ESG, and other regulations. Diane is a board member of the Harvard Club of Switzerland and founder of the Joint Alumni Forum.

Starting her legal career at Allen & Overy in London, Diane also worked offshore in investment funds where she was counsel to ISDA, and came to Switzerland to work at the director level at Credit Suisse for numerous years. Since then, Diane has advised/consulted numerous boards of directors of start-ups, SMEs, and banks on legal, compliance, corporate governance, blockchain & cryptocurrency, ESG, and other regulations.

Diane holds an MPA from Harvard Kennedy School in Government & Business, an LLB in law from Kings College London, and a Blockchain Certificate from the University of Oxford.

Registration and Tickets:

Please register with the Register Button at the top of the page to enable us to plan for your attendance at Impact Hub Viadukt on the evening if you are attending the event physically and/or send the zoom link 24 hours before the event to those who are attending virtually.

We kindly request contributions toward the costs of running this quasi-physical, quasi-virtual event. Ticket Prices are set out below:

▢ CHF20 for General Admission (full-time professionals)

▢ CHF10 for entreprenuers, retired or part-time workers

▢ GRATIS for Impact Hub members

▢ GRATIS for Virtual Viewers

▢ GRATIS for Students, Refugees, low or no income

▢ GRATIS for Trash Hero World volunteers.

For ticket purchases we recommend two options: (i) TWINT or (ii) Bank Transfer. Credit Card option is also avaailble but this method incurs administrative charges.

(i) For TWINT payments see QR Code Below

(iI) For Bank Transfer, make payment to: Harvard Club of Switzerland, Account no. 225-866468.01V, Bank: UBS AG, 8098 Zürich, BIC/SWIFT UBSWCHZH80A , IBAN CH 32 0022 5225 8664 6801 V, include REFERENCE: Last Name and "Circular Economy"

(iii) Credit Card payments can be made in the Registration link

(iv) Please reserve GRATIS places. For Virtual Viewers please select the Vitual ticket option.

Thank you!

About the Joint Alumni Forum

As “Social Responsibility Committee” of the Harvard Club of Switzerland and collaboration with the alumni clubs in Switzerland of Harvard, Oxford & Cambridge, Stanford, Yale and Columbia University, we designed a forum for discussion, education and debate on various themes encompassing social responsibility, inter alia equality themes (gender, race, minorities, diversity of thinking), human rights, refugees and environment /sustainability. The outreach is broader than the alumni of universities in the collaboration, also other alumni clubs, like-minded representatives of institutions/ interest groups and members of the public. If you’d like to participate in various projects emcompassing social responsibility, you can contact joint.alumni.forum@gmail.com.

Special mention and many thanks to Impact Hub Viadukt for being the location sponsor for this event.

Impact Hub Zürich is a community of creators, creating a radically creative world.

Special mention and many thanks to t’charta being our virtual sponsor for this event

t’charta is a boutique consultancy focusing on perfecting customer offerings, including strategic product positioning, service delivery design and go-to-market.