Growing sense of civic responsibility among youth: Kunal Sood

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New Delhi, Oct 23 (IANSlife) Acknowledging "a growing sense of civic responsibility among the youth of today", impact strategist Kunal Sood -- who launched We The Planet in 2019 to unite global leaders to reimagine our approach to the planet, people, peace, prosperity, and partnership -- says that high-impact entrepreneurship is fast becoming a prime choice to venture into as a career path.

"This is particularly common in developing economies like India where there are vast socio-economic concerns ready to be addressed. The popularity of social strategy and entrepreneurship has increased, considering the progressing COVID-19 pandemic. We have witnessed acts of altruism and heroism from all corners of the nation," Chennai-born Sood told IANSlife.

Created as an exponential global movement, the #WeThePlanet campaign envisages going beyond 'We The People,' and focussing on something that is larger than humans; as a collective, we must be focused on 'We The Planet'."

Growing up in India, Sood suffered as a young child from a learning disability and obesity, and was often the target of bullying in school. Feeling like a misfit and an outlier early in his life taught Sood valuable lessons where he went from being bullied to building the moral courage, emotional resilience and mental strength to stand up to his adversaries. "I learned how to harness my learning disability as a superpower and since then have made my life's calling to serve as a guardian and protector of the people and the planet."

After curating TEDx at the United Nations, he shifted his focus towards supporting the United Nations full time. He subsequently hosted the first ever Novus Summit in the United Nations General Assembly hall, partnered with UN to stage the first ever UN SDG Innovation Summit, and produced the first-ever Youth Dialogue.

Speaking from his experience as a former global health scientist, Sood says he is personally very optimistic about the future of global health and its evolution. "I believe that digital biology and advances in exponential technologies is going to allow us to break barriers at warp speed to strengthen our immune response to COVID-19 and extend human life both in terms of quality as well as lifespan. I also believe given the global health crisis many of the youth will find renewed purpose in serving in the field to become doctors, nurses, global healthcare practitioners."

Asked his thoughts on the pandemic itself, he says: "I view the COVID-19 crisis as a wake up call to all of us to look around and value life and every breath. Also for us to not take mother nature's gifts for granted such as the clean air we breathe, the clean water we drink and the privilege of living in a world of abundance. I feel COVID-19 serves us as a warning sign for the effects of climate change and how our selfish need for human progress and industrialization is not serving us in the long game. We need to treat COVID-19 both as a harsh lesson and a blessing to honor life in all forms not just human life but all forms of life on land and under the sea."

"There's a new force of young entrepreneurs working to create social impact-driven business models and strategic frameworks by focusing on consumer consciousness as opposed to just profit-driven conventional businesses. This new class of high impact-driven social entrepreneurs creates business to overcome the most pressing social and environmental problems by focusing on both strategy and impact. These entrepreneurs are devoted to solving problems ranging from global health and climate change to sustainable agriculture and conscious capitalism with their relentless drive for transformation and impact," concludes Sood.

The entrepreneur is set to launch #WeTheFuture in November along with Lara Stein, the Founder of TEDx.

(Siddhi Jain can be contacted at siddhi.j@ians.in)

--IANS

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