Prince William spoke with delegates at a joint Commonwealth Business and Youth Forum event on Monday during the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting taking place this week in London.
“Given the importance of the issues you are discussing today – from tackling youth unemployment to nurturing entrepreneurs of the future – I hope that this joint session will continue at future CHOGMs as we go forward,” William told the gathered delegates at the Queen Elizabeth II Conference Centre.
“Just as importantly, I hope today and this week will bring opportunities, many, many opportunities, to build meaningful networks and valuable partnerships for you to take forward.
The joint event was a roundtable discussion involving members of the Commonwealth Alliance of Young Entrepreneurs Network, which is organised and helped out by the Commonwealth Youth Forum.
“As I have travelled across the Commonwealth and here in the UK, I have always been impressed by the ingenuity, the drive and commitment of those I meet behind small and medium-sized companies particularly,” William told the crowd.
Prince William also spoke about the role the Royal Foundation that he and his brother founded can play in helping out.
“We, as the Royal Foundation, can help lead, but if we can connect to some of those bigger foundations in the world and come together with one message, imagine the focus and the change. I like the idea of a team. It’s all about how we work together.”
William met with delegates at the event, which included philanthropists and business people amidst young people. He met with the owner of Nando’s, a chain of fast food restaurants specialising in chicken, and told him that he was a fan introduced to the food by his personal protection officer.
William also talked about the ideas that some of the delegates had been championing around the Commonwealth, saying that he’d heard “how impact investment and philanthropy are helping to encourage social change and how many of you here in this room are empowering others to achieve the same.”
