Past Events

Impact Day 2024 | Less is More

2642
participants
30
countries represented
98
collaborating organizations

Speakers

In total, 173 speakers took the stage at Impact Day 2024.

Jos de Blok
Buurtzorg, CEO

Jos de Blok
Buurtzorg, CEO

Jos de Blok is the founder and CEO of Buurtzorg (neighborhood nursing), a Dutch organization with more than 15.000 employees, offering community based (home) care services to more than 80.000 patients a year. Founded in 2006 with one team of four nurses, Buurtzorg has transformed home-based health care and it has created an innovative method for nursing care at home.

As a community based and client centered organization, Buurtzorg connects highly qualified licensed nurses and clients to create positive and proactive solutions that are effective, holistic, and sustainable. Organized in small autonomous teams of up to 12 nurses within a neighborhood-sized care area, Buurtzorg nurses bring groundbreaking synergy and experti se in a direct and connected relationship between caregiver and client. Buurtzorg has succeeded in reducing administrative burden for nurses, improving quality of care and raising work satisfaction for their employees (Buurtzorg was awarded five times employer of the year in the Netherlands).

Buurtzorg is supported by an innovative IT system and works without management structure. Internationalizaion started by launching in countries like Sweden, Japan, China, Austria, Germany, Denmark, France and UK.Jos de Blok is a nurse by education and considered a change agent in the Netherlands when it comes to the organization of community based (home) care. Before he established Buurtzorg he had several senior management positions in home care organizations including director Innovations for medical services.
Jeremy Schwartz
Former CEO & MD of Coca-Cola, L'Oreal, Pandora and The Body Shop

Jeremy Schwartz
Former CEO & MD of Coca-Cola, L'Oreal, Pandora and The Body Shop

Renowned for fusing sustainability with commerciality, Jeremy Schwartz is an expert in innovation, management and sustainability having held senior roles at some of the world’s biggest brands including Coca-Cola and L’Oréal. As a speaker, he offers businesses the opportunity to improve their brand, while putting sustainability and innovation at the heart of what they do. Jeremy’s insightful speeches shed light on how organisations can put the protection of the environment at the core of their operations without forfeiting profitability.

Jeremy graduated from the University of Cambridge after completing a degree at the University of Sheffield. He then moved into the world of business and was named Marketing Director of L’Oréal in 1992. During his five years with the health care brand, he relaunched the ‘Because I’m worth it’ slogan and established it worldwide. In 1997 he became Director of Innovation and Marketing at Coca-Cola. While in this position he created Coke Black, which over time has evolved to be Coca-Cola Zero and became a $1billion product. Jeremy’s career continued to progress and in 2002 he was tasked with halting a 10-year decline as Director of Brand Marketing at Sainsbury’s. Tackling the challenge head-on he delivered a 5% growth in sales for the 2005 financial year and set the platform for the business to experience 20 continuous quarters of growth and recruit six million new customers.

Continuing in the food industry, he became the CEO of The Sauce Co. He achieved award-winning success as the company was the Best New Supermarket Brand and Best Chilled Soup in the Supermarket Quality Food Awards, Winner of the Grocer. Branded Excellence Award. He held this role while holding a position on the Board of Trustees of The Against Malaria Foundation. Over 10 years after leaving the company he became Managing Director of L’Oréal. Again, as he has done throughout his career Jeremy experienced great success. He drove the company forward to become the number one cosmetic company in the UK after 30 years of being number two or three. He has also been the CEO of The Body Shop, where he launched the Enrich Not Exploit campaign, the companies promise to support a greener more sustainable planet. He was also largely responsible for making 100% of the products vegan, creating incomes for indigenous people and protecting endangered rainforests. The success of the business saw it win the World Retail Awards for Responsible Retailer. In 2018 he was named Joint CEO of Pandora and oversaw a £145million cost-saving programme and boosted the brand’s sales. More recently he became the Chairman of Sustainability and Inclusion at Kantar, Senior Advisor for McKinsey Business Transformation and Non-Executive Director of Revolution Beauty.
Mohammed Qahtani
Qahtani_Speaks, Founder

Mohammed Qahtani
Qahtani_Speaks, Founder

World Champion of public speaking 2015. Five times TEDx speaker. Co-Founder of the Saudi Stuttering Association.
Anete Garoza
1MTN, Co-Founder and Chief Climate Officer

Anete Garoza
1MTN, Co-Founder and Chief Climate Officer

Anete Garoza is a highly regarded international climate lawyer and Forbes 30 Under 30 recipient. She co-founded and currently serves as the Chief Climate Officer of 1MTN, a startup on a mission to restore one million hectares of degraded land in Africa by 2030.

Anete’s expertise in climate law is evident through her extensive involvement in the Voluntary Carbon Market, where she has advised on projects spanning afforestation, agriculture, and nature restoration. Additionally, she provides invaluable guidance to governments on implementing Article 6 of the Paris Agreement.

Driven by her profound passion and a sense of urgency, Anete co-founded 1MTN to focus on high-quality nature-based carbon removal projects in Africa, effectively combating climate change and biodiversity loss and fostering equitable development.

Beyond her professional achievements, Anete actively raises awareness and advocates for sustainable development and climate law. Her advocacy efforts centre around catalysing the development of carbon removal projects, promoting investments in nature-based solutions, and advocating for robust regulatory frameworks, with a particular emphasis on social co-benefit accounting.

Anete’s insights have been shared on global platforms such as COP27, the World Economic Forum, Africa Climate Summit 2023, and New York Climate Week. As a representative of 1MTN at the UAE Independent Climate Change Accelerator and the Ambassador of Nairobi in the esteemed Top Tier Impact Network, she builds bridges between impactful investments and sustainable solutions for Africa.
Clover Hogan
Force of Nature, Founder

Clover Hogan
Force of Nature, Founder

Clover Hogan is a climate activist and the founder of Force of Nature – the youth non-profit mobilising mindsets for climate action. She has worked alongside the world’s leading authorities on sustainability, consulted within the boardrooms of Fortune 50 companies, and counselled heads of state. Her TED talk, ‘What to do when climate change feels unstoppable’, has been viewed 2 million times.
Martin Villig
Bolt, Co-founder

Martin Villig
Bolt, Co-founder

Martin VIllig is the co-founder of the super app Bolt, which serves 75 million passengers in 45 European and African countries. Martin has been an entrepreneur for 20 years and started and sold his first startup in 1999. Previously, he has worked in leading positions at Skype, Fortumo and NASDAQ Tallinn Stock Exchange.

He is a leading figure in the Estonian startup community, having co-founded the Estonian Founders’ Society and the Garage48 Foundation, which organizes hackathons across Europe. In 2018, Martin established an Education Fund containing 1 million euros to give impetus to new educational initiatives in Estonia. In 2020, Martin founded Code Jõhvi, a school with 200 students based on a next generation platform.

Martin graduated from the Estonian Business School. He is a father of two grown children and enjoys traveling with his family. Martin also enjoys hiking, various sports, and making the world a better place.

Highlights of 2024 in Our Blog

Co-Creators 2024

Impact Day 2023 | Sustainability as Humanity: (im)Possible?

2689
participants
30
countries represented
89+
collaborating organizations

Speakers

All together 180 speakers shared their knowledge & insights during Impact Day 2023.

Terry Virts
Former NASA Astronaut

Terry Virts
Former NASA Astronaut

Col. Terry Virts (ret) served as a U.S. Air Force test fighter pilot, is a NASA veteran of two spaceflights and a graduate of the U.S. Air Force Academy, Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University and Harvard Business School.

In 2019 he directed his first film, One More Orbit. His second book, How to Astronaut, continues to amass excellent reviews. He is currently involved in several film and television projects, serves on corporate boards, consults to the entertainment industry, writes and promotes public policy.

He is a celebrated thought leader, speaker and author whose seven months in space included: piloting the Space Shuttle; commanding the International Space Station; three spacewalks; and performing scientific experiments, while working closely with multiple international partners. Virts worked with Russian Space Agency cosmonauts during some of the most stressful U.S.-Russian relations since the Cold War.

While in space he took more than 300,000 photos – more than on any other space mission. The images are an integral component of the National Geographic IMAX film A Beautiful Planet, which Virts also shot and stars in. His first book for National Geographic, View From Above, combines his best photography with stories about spaceflight alongside his perspectives about life on earth and our place in the cosmos.

An in-demand speaker at events across the globe, Virts’ inspires audiences with stories from space as well as his insights into life on earth. He brings his unique perspective to businesses worldwide on diverse topics such as our environment, global wealth, intercultural leadership, crisis and risk management, innovation, strategy and vision and decision making.
Kersti Kaljulaid
Former President of Estonia

Kersti Kaljulaid
Former President of Estonia

Kersti Kaljulaid served as the President of the Republic of Estonia from 2016-2021. During her time in office, she made her presence felt in both her homeland and the international arena.

Previously she had been serving as a Member of the European Court of Auditors, advising Prime Minister Mart Laar and holding diferent top level positions in energy, investment banking and telecom sector. Genetic engineer and economist by education, she has been a member of the Supervisory Board of the Estonian Genome Center and the Council Chair of the University of Tartu from 2012 to 2016.

In summer 2021, UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres appointed President Kaljulaid to the position of Global Advocate for the ‘Every Woman Every Child’ strategy on the health and well-being of women, children and adolescents around the world for the next two years. She was also the first Estonian to be featured in the Forbes World’s 100 Most Powerful Women.

Kersti Kaljulaid has become a sought-after speaker at high-level forums on digital, security and foreign-policy topics and more broadly for analysing and interpreting societal and economic change. President Kaljulaid is a vocal advocate of human rights, rule of law, freedom of speech and democracy. One of the principles in the in office of president has been the one she set out upon her inauguration: “I am never silent when our security is in question, when our freedoms are at stake or when those weaker than us are treated unjustly
Gunter Pauli
Entrepreneur and Author

Gunter Pauli
Entrepreneur and Author

Gunter Pauli is the pioneer who has been named both “The Steve Jobs of Sustainability” and “The Che Guevara of Sustainability”. Recognized as an entrepreneur, skilled in making Sustainable Development happen, master in the design of innovative business models that build resilience and strengthens The Commons. Top level public speaker. Strong network throughout the world in science and start-ups, founder of the Zero Emissions Research and Initiatives (ZERI) and author of The Blue Economy. Gunter has published 20 books, which have been printed in +30 languages and 365 fables, inspiring stories bringing science and emotional intelligence to children.
Paul Hawken
Project Regeneration, Founder

Paul Hawken
Project Regeneration, Founder

Paul Hawken starts ecological businesses, writes about nature and commerce, and consults with heads of state and CEOs on climatic, economic and ecological regeneration. He has appeared on numerous media including the Today Show, Talk of the Nation, Bill Maher, CBS This Morning and others, and his work has been profiled or featured in hundreds of articles including the Wall Street Journal, New York Times, Newsweek, Washington Post, Forbes, and Business Week. He has written nine books including six national and NYT bestsellers: Growing a Business, The Next Economy, The Ecology of Commerce, Blessed Unrest, Drawdown, and Regeneration. He is published in 30 languages and his books are available in over 90 countries. His latest book, Regeneration, Ending the Climate Crisis in One Generation, was published by Penguin Randomhouse September, 2021, his sequel to Drawdown. He is the founder of both Project Drawdown and Project Regeneration (regeneration.org). Project Regeneration is creating the world’s largest, most complete listing and network of solutions to the climate crisis.

Paul will take on stage virtually.
Jone Sestakauskaite
Neste, Sustainable Partnerships Manager Baltics

Jone Sestakauskaite
Neste, Sustainable Partnerships Manager Baltics

Jone Sestakauskaite has an international professional background from working at different Nordic organizations, both private and public, in Sweden and in the Baltics. She has especially focused on the Nordic-Baltic trade relations during her role as Policy Officer at the Swedish Embassy in Lithuania, later as Managing Director of the Swedish Chamber of Commerce in Lithuania. Currently, Jone is working as Sustainable Partnerships Manager in Baltics at Neste. Jone is still active with the Swedish Chamber of Commerce as Board Member and has 18+ years experience of living in Sweden.
Taavi Kotka
KOOS.io, Co-Founder and CEO

Taavi Kotka
KOOS.io, Co-Founder and CEO

Taavi Kotka is a serial entrepreneur, angel investor in a number of unicorns, first CIO for the Government of Estonia and philanthropist. He is a pioneer of e-Estonia and cofounder of the world’s first e-Residency program. Taavi is also a big supporter of women in tech, founder of HK Unicorn Squad.
Nordic Business Forum has elected him as one of The Brightest Business Minds in Northern Europe. He has been awarded E&Y Entrepreneur of the year in Estonia. And in 2016, Taavi was granted a recognition from the President of Estonia.

Zoom into the Impact & Stories of 2023

Co-Creators 2023

Impact Day 2022 | Sustainable Business - 100 Billion Issue or A Bubble?

1458
participants
65+
collaborating organizations
46
expo area booths

Speakers

All together 94 speakers shared their knowledge & insights during Impact Day 2022.

Kai Realo
Ragn-Sells Estonia, CEO

Kai Realo
Ragn-Sells Estonia, CEO

Kai has been a circular economy enthusiast since the summer of 2021, when she started managing one of the most environmentally friendly companies in Estonia, Ragn-Sells. Prior to that, Kai worked in the retail industry for many years (e.g. for Statoil / Circle K for 16 years and being a senior manager there for the last 9 years). Kai has a master’s degree from the University of Tartu in the field of marketing and management, and these topics are also close to her heart. She has published many articles and interviews specifically on the topics of management quality and value-based management. In 2018 Kai was also chosen as the best manager in Estonia at the Äripäev’s management conference.

In addition to her main job, Kai is also the chairman of council of the Central Union of Estonian Employers and also belongs to the council of ELRON. While Kai used to like to travel a lot in her spare time, she now has also started to think more about her own carbon footprint. Kai joined an environmentally friendly company to help all Estonians better understand how everyone can make their small contribution to the green revolution and that it can be a very pleasant activity.
Martin Villig
Bolt, Co-founder

Martin Villig
Bolt, Co-founder

Martin VIllig is the co-founder of the super app Bolt, which serves 75 million passengers in 45 European and African countries. Martin has been an entrepreneur for 20 years and started and sold his first startup in 1999. Previously, he has worked in leading positions at Skype, Fortumo and NASDAQ Tallinn Stock Exchange.

He is a leading figure in the Estonian startup community, having co-founded the Estonian Founders’ Society and the Garage48 Foundation, which organizes hackathons across Europe. In 2018, Martin established an Education Fund containing 1 million euros to give impetus to new educational initiatives in Estonia. In 2020, Martin founded Code Jõhvi, a school with 200 students based on a next generation platform.

Martin graduated from the Estonian Business School. He is a father of two grown children and enjoys traveling with his family. Martin also enjoys hiking, various sports, and making the world a better place.
Reet Aus
Aus Design and Upmade, Founder

Reet Aus
Aus Design and Upmade, Founder

Reet is a recognized fashion designer and environmental activist. She’s an advocate of valuable recycling and sustainable design, whose goal is to make the fashion world more ethical and develop a revalued fashion environment. Raising awareness, saving resources, sustainability, recycling, reducing the environmental impact are the keywords that resonate with her and for which Reet considers the effort and motivated contribution as a society to be critically important both here in Estonia and on a global level.
Lauri Lugna
Kredex/EAS, Chairman of the board

Lauri Lugna
Kredex/EAS, Chairman of the board

Lauri Lugna has been the chairman of the board of the EAS and KredEx joint institution since January 2022. For the past seven years, as chancellor, he has managed the administrative area of the Ministry of the Interior with the largest workforce in Estonia. Lugna has been in charge of serving customers and making traffic safer as the Deputy General Director of the Road Administration. He has a bachelor’s degree in public administration from the University of Tartu and a master’s degree in politics and social sciences from the Katholieke Universiteit Leuven. He is currently continuing his studies in the EBS Executive MBA program.
Kadi Kenk
Let´s Do It Foundation, Societal Change Management Expert

Kadi Kenk
Let´s Do It Foundation, Societal Change Management Expert

Kadi is a societal change management expert who consults and mentors both companies and public administration on the transition to circular economy. She is a CIRCO trainer, certified Zero Waste ambassador and trainer and an advocate for circular policies in the EU. Kadi represents Estonian Responsible Business Forum in the EU circular business association and teaches circular business model design in Estonian Business School and Estonian Academy of Arts. She is currently doing her PhD in circular economy and the role of technology in material circulation in Estonian University of Life Sciences.
Taavi Veskimägi
Elering, Chairman of the board; former Minister of Finance

Taavi Veskimägi
Elering, Chairman of the board; former Minister of Finance

Taavi Veskimägi has been the chairman of the board of Elering AS, the manager of the Estonian electricity and gas transmission system, since 2009, when the company was founded.

Taavi has been a member of two Riigikogu structures, being both the chairman of the parliamentary faction and the deputy chairman of the Riigikogu during that time. 2003-2005 Taavi Veskimägi was the Minister of Finance of the Republic of Estonia. He started his career as a civil servant in the Ministry of Finance in 1996, where he worked as the head of the Public Administration Department and later as an advisor to the Ministry.

Taavi Veskimägi has experience in the third sector, primarily as the founder and leader of the Estonian Defense Industry Association and as a long-term board member of the Estonian Hunting Society. For many years, he was the chairman of the Council of the Central Union of Employers, a member of the council of many companies (AS Eesti Post, Tallinna Sadam, Olympic Entertainment Group AS, Milrem AS, etc.) and an advisor to the investment company Alta Capital Partners. In the Central Union of Employers, he heads the environment and responsible business working group.

In 2017, Taavi was awarded the Order of the White Star, Estonia’s national decoration, as an energy sector developer.

Past Events

Past Events

Impact Day 2024 | Less is More

Speakers

Highlights of 2024 in Our Blog

Clover Hogan: I Hope to Inspire People to Take Ownership of Their Communities

Impact Day 2024 Crossed the Finish Line and Impacted Thousands of People

Jos de Blok: We Need to Nurture Trustful Relationships

Co-Creators 2024

Impact Day 2023 | Sustainability as Humanity: (im)Possible?

Speakers

Zoom into the Impact & Stories of 2023

From vision to victory: Impact Day proves that sustainability is here to stay

Meet Our First-Ever Impact Report: Transparent Overview of Impact Day

What to Do or Not to Do with Your (Sustainability) Event: Unwrapping the Feedback of Impact Day 2023

Co-Creators 2023

Impact Day 2022 | Sustainable Business - 100 Billion Issue or A Bubble?

Speakers

Co-Creators 2022