The G20 Entrepreneurship Roundtable 2022, which focused on the theme of "Inclusive and Sustainable Entrepreneurship as Job Creation Instruments," was cohosted by the Entrepreneurship Research Center on G20 Economies, Tsinghua University and the Ministry of Manpower of the Republic of Indonesia on October 26, 2022. The G20 Entrepreneurship Research Center has held the roundtable for six consecutive years and co-hosted the event with the G20 presidency for the first time this year. The meeting had two offline venues in Beijing, China and Jakarta, Indonesia.

Dr. Ida Fauziyah, minister of Manpower of the Republic of Indonesia, and YU Jiadong, vice minister of Human Resources and Social Security of the PRC, spoke at the meeting.

Dr. Ida Fauziyah, minister of Manpower of the Republic of Indonesia

Professor GAO Jian, director of the Entrepreneurship Research Center on G20 Economies and professor at Tsinghua University School of Economics and Management, Professor Anwar Sanusi, chair of the G20 Employment Working Group and secretary general of the Ministry of Manpower of Indonesia, and Dragan Radic, head of the Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs) Unit of the International Labour Organization (ILO), delivered keynote speeches.

Fauziyah said the COVID-19 pandemic and global economic slowdown have put massive pressure on the entrepreneurial world, exposing weaknesses in productivity, management, and business skills of SMEs compared to big companies. In order to tackle these challenges, the G20 Labour and Employment Ministers' Meeting (LEMM) passed the Policy Recommendation on Promoting Entrepreneurship and Supporting Micro, Small and Medium-sized Enterprises (MSMEs) as Job Creation Instruments. Fauziyah said the G20 Entrepreneurship Roundtable has laid a good foundation for G20 members to cooperate, share, and jointly address challenges. She said she also hoped the discussion would generate ideas, solutions, and concrete steps to encourage inclusive and sustainable entrepreneurship as an instrument of job creation that is resistant to future shocks and uncertainties.

Vice Minister YU Jiadong said the G20 Entrepreneurship Roundtable has become an important platform to share insights, exchange experience in promoting entrepreneurship, provide support for G20 members to improve their entrepreneurship policies and its influence has continued to increase. He said the 2022 G20 LEMM considered sustainable entrepreneurship an important topic. The G20 Entrepreneurship Action Plan reached by G20 LEMM in 2016, in combination with new challenges in global entrepreneurship, will further promote entrepreneurship and support the development of SMEs, which are considered an important engine for stable job growth. The G20 Entrepreneurship Roundtable 2022, in his words, was an important step to implement consensus among the G20 Labour and Employment Ministers. YU called on all members to use the roundtable to exchange experiences, build consensus, and contribute insights to the people-oriented recovery through entrepreneurship.

Professor GAO Jian spoke to introduce the Progress Report on the G20 Entrepreneurship Action Plan (2017-2021) and said the implementation of the G20 Entrepreneurship Action Plan is very important for business development in the G20 members, and also for leveraging the role of business startups in boosting employment and stimulating high-quality growth. The members made progress in implementing the Action Plan in the last five years, but challenges remain. GAO offered five suggestions: further improve the quality of entrepreneurial activities and leverage the role of business startups to boost employment; improve the government's business service system and make it more effective; encourage organizations to pursue innovation and improve the quality of services for entrepreneurs; build a global entrepreneurial cooperation and incubation network to enhance the ability of MSMEs and startups to expand the global market; and promote inclusive and sustainable entrepreneurship, and create an equal environment for businesses startups.

Professor GAO Jian, director of the Entrepreneurship Research Center on G20 Economies and professor at Tsinghua University School of Economics and Management

Professor Anwar Sanusi pointed out in his keynote speech that the G20 Entrepreneurship Roundtable was one of a series of activities of the G20 Employment Working Group in 2022, and the event was in line with the outcome in the G20 LEMM, which promoted inclusive and sustainable entrepreneurship to create stable jobs. Sanusi also shared policy recommendations from the G20 LEMM on promoting entrepreneurship and supporting MSMEs. The recommendations include supporting a conducive business environment and enterprise formalization, promoting entrepreneurship and entrepreneurial training, helping entrepreneurs and MSMEs address challenges and sustain their development, and protecting the rights and interests of entrepreneurs, MSMEs, and their employees.

Dragan Radic said entrepreneurs and SMEs play an important role in economic development and social progress because they are drivers of economic and social development and are key to promoting decent work. Radic shared the ILO's policy recommendations on the challenges facing entrepreneurs and SMEs, including continuously optimizing the business environment, providing high-quality business development services, broadening fundraising channels, improving market systems, promoting formalization and enhancing enterprise productivity and resilience.

Group photo at the G20 Entrepreneurship Roundtable

The G20 Entrepreneurship Roundtable 2022 focused on five topics: strengthening policies to support inclusive and sustainable entrepreneurship, enhancing innovation and entrepreneurship capacity, expanding the international cooperation network on entrepreneurship, promoting green and digital entrepreneurship, and boosting inclusive and sustainable SMEs and startups. Representatives in attendance included those from governments, universities, enterprises, and research institutes of the G20 members, international organizations such as the ILO, OECD, UNESCO, and UN Women, as well as social groups such as the Youth 20. They met to exchange ideas about the latest entrepreneurial perceptions and practices.

Source: The Entrepreneurship Research Center on G20 Economies, Tsinghua University

Editor: REN Zhongxi