Everything we produce and consume has an impact on the environment, on social fabrics, and on the economy. This impact can be positive or negative and, frequently, some combination of the two.

Responsive governments committed to improving the broader trade facilitation and business environment can help companies of all sizes by improving infrastructure: roads, transportation, ports, information and communication technology, and electricity.

Entrepreneurs - both women and men - need equal and fair access to finance - to create new businesses, to reach to new markets, and to adapt to climate change.

Around the world, it is much more difficult for women than for men to run a successful business. Even when laws are not explicitly biased against them, companies owned and operated by women often face discrimination every step of the way, from obtaining finance to finding customers.

Governments everywhere have ministries dedicated to women's affairs. I know of only one with a Ministry for Women Empowerment: Indonesia. Charged with the 'realization of gender equality and justice' together with children's well-being, the ministry frames gender equality as a matter of justice.

Skills development as a means to income generation is the key to integrate vulnerable migrants into the mainstream of society and to equip them for an eventual return home.

We survey companies and ask them what the barriers to export and import are. Once we map these barriers, we sit down with the companies on one side and the government and regulatory agencies on the other and help them identify obstacles to trade and what has to be done to tackle them.

The social and legal discrimination that relegates hundreds of women to subordinate or marginal economic roles has a huge aggregate cost.

Technology is making it easier for women to connect to business opportunities around the world. Legal obstacles must not be allowed to stand in their way. That's not just because it's economically smart. It's because discrimination shouldn't be the law.