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Melbourne: Free Trade: The Driving Force of the Global Economy

Free trade is vital to the strength of the global economy and the healthy flow of investment around the world. In the current economic climate, trade tensions between China and the United States have seen growing concerns about the future of global trade relations.

On Thursday 10 May, the Australia China Business Council Victoria, the American Chamber of Commerce and the German-Australia Chamber of Industry and Commerce hosted a business dinner with keynote speaker, Andrew MacKenzie, CEO, BHP,  who spoke on ‘Free Trade: The Driving Force of the Global Economy’

The focus of the event was the future of free trade and Andrew underlined the importance of working together and sharing ideas in order to create the innovative ideas needed to advance the global economy.

Andrew has over 30 years’ experience in oil and gas, petrochemicals and minerals and has held senior positions in BP and Rio Tinto. During his career, he has also chaired Demos, one of the UK’s most influential think-tanks. 

In his presentation, Andrew spoke about BHP’s work to encourage diversity and equal gender representation among employees. Additionally, he spoke about his belief that artificial intelligence technology has the potential to revolutionise the mining industry, making mining jobs of the future more safe and accessible to all.

Andrew also expressed concerns about excessive IP protection and the effect that he believes it could have on the advancement of globalisation. He said that excessive IP protection may be detrimental to the creation of new ideas and furthermore, collaboration and innovation.

ACBC Victoria thank the German-Australia Chamber of Industry and Commerce for facilitating this event and for giving us the opportunity of including our members as guests. We would also like to thank Andrew MacKenzie for sharing his insights and expertise.  We know all who attended came away with a greater depth of understanding of the importance of Free Trade in our globalised world.