PRESIDENT’S MESSAGE


TOWARDS A BETTER GOVERNED PLANET
Since its earliest beginnings, Gold Mercury International has consistently recognised that good governance, peace, democracy, and cooperation cannot be protected or achieved without the rule of law and a clear compact and partnership among governments, international organisations, business, industry, and society as a whole.

It has always been our policy to form a key bridge between governments and industry in the search for sustainable futures based on a clear win-win amongst all global governance actors.

Gold Mercury Peace & Cooperation Symbol

Globalisation is now a reality.  Since the 1960s, Gold Mercury’s efforts and  Sustainable Global Governance message have promoted peaceful, cooperative trade among businesses and nations, as well as dialogue among governments and civil society. This has assisted in more humane and ethical globalisation and the democratisation effort of many nations.

THE FIRST GOVERNANCE AWARDS
Gold Mercury pioneered the creation of the first awards to recognise good governance in 1961. Our Gold Mercury Awards have rewarded corporations worldwide for improving corporate governance and social responsibility, international trade, industrial development and processes, union relations, worker safety, product and service quality standards, and research and development for innovation and the environment. We were the clear pioneers in this area.

CRCOur Awards recognise individual and institutional efforts and initiatives to promote humanitarian efforts and develop better understanding and communication among people. They include Nobel Prize winners, royal houses, and global organisations such as the United Nations and the International Red Cross. These recipients are committed to positively impacting and promoting a more connected and compassionate global community. In 1979, we presented Enrique de la Mata Gorostizaga, Vice President of the International Red Cross, with the award for humanitarian first-response relief activities in conflict situations and for upholding humanitarian law worldwide.

GOLD MERCURY AWARDS TO GLOBAL INSTITUTIONS
Gold Mercury International awarded FAO, the Food and Agriculture Organisation of the United Nations and UNICEF, and the United Nations Children Fund for their work and unique mission of combating poverty, hunger, and malnutrition worldwide, a challenge that confronts us all. We awarded the United Nations for its efforts in the search for peace in numerous regions of the world. We will strive to continue our relationship with FAO (Food and Agriculture Organisation) and U.N. bodies to improve and reduce the divide between the rich and the poor and make the world safer. This pledge is vital considering the current state of global affairs.

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GOLD MERCURY PEACE & COOPERATION AWARD
Our organisation’s principal award, which commenced in 1970, will always be for peace. Awarding a peace prize is both a difficult task and a great responsibility. The future of peace is no longer confined to conflicts among nations; it also includes the ability to anticipate the future and protect our common public goods, as well as find and co-create solutions via the most beautiful word that I know: cooperation.

One has to bear in mind the risks and dangers of searching and fighting for peace, considering that some of our peace award winners have lost or risked their lives fighting for a better tomorrow.

Anwar Sadat EgyptTHE MIDDLE EAST & CHINA AWARDS President Anwar Sadat of Egypt lost his life in the search for peace in the Middle East. In 1978, we gave President Sadat the Gold Mercury Award for Peace for his efforts in the Middle East peace process and the resulting Camp David Accords. The 1979 Gold Mercury Peace & Cooperation Conference in Cairo, hosted by President Sadat, promoted increased cooperation between all of the diverse countries represented at the conference.

PrintIn 1984, Zhao Ziyang, then General Secretary of the Chinese Communist Party, won the Gold Mercury Award for Peace. Ziyang was one of the most reform-minded leaders of the 1980s and foresaw the future challenges that his country would face in a globalised world.

GOLD MERCURY & THE COLD WAR
Many of the Gold Mercury Peace Awards have been given to heads of state and commanders-in-chief of the largest armies in the world—statesmen who were heavily responsible for maintaining stability in the world during difficult periods, such as the Cold War.

Gold Mercury, during the 1970s and 1980s, became a bridge between the two superpowers by fostering relations and cooperation, recognising first President Gerald Ford in 1976, then Soviet leader Leonid Brezhnev in 1980 and finally President Ronald Reagan in 1985.

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President Ford received the award for setting new limitations upon nuclear weapons in conjunction with Soviet leader Brezhnev and for preventing a new war in the Middle East by bringing two adversaries to a peace table and persuading them to accept an interim truce agreement.

Leonid Brezhnev, while greatly expanding the Soviet Union’s military-industrial complex, attempted in the 1970s to normalise relations with the West and promote détente with the U.S. An example of such an attempt is when he and U.S. President Richard Nixon signed the SALT treaty, freezing the build-up of certain U.S. and Soviet weapons systems.

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Ronald Reagan, the second U.S. president to be awarded our peace award, followed a foreign policy of ‘peace through strength’ but also sought to improve relations with the Soviet Union. In dramatic meetings with Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev, he negotiated a treaty that would eliminate intermediate-range nuclear missiles. In this case, diplomacy and cooperation enabled the superpowers to recognise that in the event of nuclear conflict, neither one could emerge victorious.

Today, whilst new countries may seek nuclear capabilities, other countries are entering a new transition in search of a more just, free and humane future. Here, I have to quote the foresight of the great scientist and pacifist Albert Einstein in 1946:

“Today we must abandon competition and secure cooperation. This must be the central fact in all our considerations of international affairs; otherwise we face certain disaster. Past thinking and methods did not prevent world wars. Future thinking must prevent wars.”

GOLD MERCURY & SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT
Future thinking and foresight are what we love to do at Gold Mercury. Understand and face the challenges of tomorrow with clear frameworks, tools and proposals that are inclusive and foster the cooperation and understanding of all stakeholders. The challenges of the new millennium, including the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals, make the mission of Gold Mercury International and our Awards even more critical now than in the past.

We will continue to work with governments, corporations, and other global governance stakeholders to find solutions and new frameworks for addressing these global challenges.

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People of different nations must choose to work together as ‘global citizens’ in peace and to make the necessary cultural and ideological transitions to guarantee our planetary survival.

Many of the world’s leaders, heads of state and government, world organisations, corporations and civil society actors have supported Gold Mercury International in its quest for improving foresight in Global Governance, peace and cooperation. We know they will continue supporting us in facing the challenges ahead.

“Thank you.”

Nicolas De Santis
President
Gold Mercury International

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