LIZ McAREAVEY
It's fair to say that human development has seen its greatest step forward in the last 50 years than since we first discovered we had an imagination some 30,000 years ago. We have witnessed a number of revolutions from the cognitive revolution, through the agricultural and industrial to the now technological revolution all of which have shaped our societies, influenced our cultures and unified the world through trade, collaboration and a shared sense of direction.
It’s hard to imagine that 3,000 years ago international commerce was alive and well with the Silk Road busy not only with silks from China but also spices from India and gold from Africa - all being traded by simple currency and trust.
Globalisation and world trade is not standing still. Scotland has many opportunities to establish itself as a major global trader and be part of this. Today we see China opening up its international reach with its new campaign 'one belt one road'. The UK is still the largest investment market for the US seeking a good return on investment funds and even with the uncertainty of Brexit European markets are pushing for growth.
What we need is a greater sharing of knowledge and experience to support our SMEs scale, internationalise and create a strong economy for Scotland. For example, the University of Edinburgh is top 3 in the world for Big Data and supercomputers, enabling rapid development of FinTech which I believe will kick off the next revolution. What hinders this is the gap between the agile, early-adopting, technology savvy SMEs and the mammoth banking institutions that are being left behind with their technology, yet they have all the expertise in the world of regulation.
Scale and internationalisation seem to be the words of the moment and with 99.3% of our businesses being SMEs it's not hard to see the impact this can have on economic growth, job creation and infrastructure investment.
We have strong transport links, a highly educated workforce, world leading research and an entrepreneurial culture to match this knowledge and research. So what's the missing ingredient?
Everyone thinks they can do it alone and we're not utilising or developing the existing networks that get people together to share, question and cross fertilise ideas. The Scottish Enlightenment of the 18th century that saw our country revolutionise thinking around the world, was born out of citizens of all shapes and sizes, classes, education and trades living and socialising together sparking ideas and innovation.
It’s clear we've no lack of ideas and innovation – but today what we need is more knowledge sharing and face to face interaction. During an age of social media and technology, for business truly to work, looking back to imagination, communities, social interaction and trust could make all the difference.
Liz McAreavey is chief executive of Edinburgh Chamber of Commerce
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