and it made us all feel better for the whole day. it was like a cold shower of genius. it was wonderful. now as far as repertory is concerned, she has played and recorded all of bach, all of mozart, all of beethoven, and a great deal of other things. but what's more important is she's done wonders for contemporary music. and she has a foundation for young people. and she furthers that career by getting them great master teachers, by getting them instruments and by seeing to it that current contemporary composers compose for them. and she's made it her life's calling to have people such as

wolf gang ream and on a lesser level, me, and we all write for her and her students. it's a marvellous thing to see in every major city in the world these young people who all come under the eejs of her and wouldn't be there if it weren't for her. now -- oh yeah. this is something that worried me a little bit because her ambition and her will are so amazing that when she started to record, the mozart and the bach, she decided she would also conduct them. it's true. i told her with her ambition

another couple years and she'd make records of the maller symphonies. i bet she could. any way she is unique. there's nobody like her. she is a complete pota musician and we're all very lucky she's around playing for us. so here's your honorary artist of the year. [ applause ]

>> ladies and gentlemen, thank you very much for your way too kind words. what would be more wonderful for a musician than being a muse for one of the greatest composers of our time. certainly my favorite composer. i am honored and delighted and

thrilled to be here tonight and to accept this tremendous award. when i came to the united states of america in 1980 and did my debut here in washington, i wouldn't have dreamt of ever being part of such an ill lus treehouse group of recipients from the past and present. but it's also played another important part of my life, a part of presenting me with this most memorable evening. it's the place where i met my long-term collaborator some 24 years ago. and i'm very happy and grateful that he's here tonight joining me on stage and i don't want to spoil the evening any longer with a prolonged speech of mine. i will just pass on with the words of a great german author. music takes on our words at the

end. so let's just move on to summertime and i wish you all a wonderful evening. [ applause ] ♪ ♪

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♪ [ applause ] >> okay. do you think he's here? is ian here? can anyone point out my republican brother. >> that could not have been easy. >> where is he?

all right. okay. to introduce the distinguished business leadership award, we'd like to invite a young man to the stage whose accomplishments are wide ranging and undeniably impressive. in his capacity as usaid administrator, dr. rasis shaw has approaches to international aid and agricultural policy. as administrator, he spear headed international relief efforts to earthquake victims in haiti and flood victims in pakist pakistan. he's worked closely with dr. jill biden to bring assistance to the millions of people affected by famine in the horn of africa. >> as under secretary of research, session, and economics at the department of agriculture, he led the participation in the hunger

initiative. and dr. shaw developed a number of innovative programs and partnerships that addressed the real issues involving food and hunger. we're all excited to see what the future holds for this brilliant young man, ladies and gentlemen, dr. shaw. [ applause ] >> thank you and evening evening. a special thank you to mica and joe and thank you senator hagel for hosting us this evening. it's an honor for more to be such an incredibly-distinguished audience. an audience of leaders who have imagined different possibilities for our world in so many different fields and in particular in different ways to make our country safe and secure. it is in that setting that it's my distinct honor to introduce a friend of mine, paul poleman.

it's unfortunate that just this evening, more than 900 million people around our planet will go to bed hungry. and it's unfortunate that more than 500 million of them are young children. and many of them because of their chronic hunger will not have the stroept fight the next illness and will succumb when they should persevere. many will not have the strength for their brains to develop so can grow and contribute to make their world more productive. it's in that world where we're able to honor tonight a business leader, paul poleman, who runs a massive consumer goods company and has a very impressive background at nestle and other firms. and he brings an absolute and unique commitment to ensuring that business leaders around our

world commit themselves to literally ending hunger, ending preventable child death, and making sure that the reach of modern capitalism touches even those families that sometimes are forgotten. and it's with his perspective that corporate ceos and corporate entities have both the responsibility and a tremendous business opportunity in addressing the needs of very poor and often unstable environments that he has created a number of efforts that are literally changing the way companies large and small see their role in addressing these global challenges. he's brought together other ceos of similarly large firms to say enough is enough and we have to work together to prevent the next famine in the horn of africa because it's a plight on our conscious and a very serious security threat to all of us.

he's brought together companies with more than $3 trillion in revenue, trillion with a "t", even a big number in this town, so they can actually think about how they can improve the products they offer and how they could partner with the united nations and so many other agencies around the world to reach those children who otherwise don't get enough calories and don't get enough quality calories to learn, grow, and thrive. and with this new effort called new visions for agriculture, he's helped to make sure these companies work together with local leaders and local businesses and local governments to make sure that we generate the kind of hard-nosed corporate results that we all value. as a result, he's launching a public/private partnership that could triple tanzania's

agricultural output, generate half a million jobs, and lift two million people out of poverty. paul's worked aggressively with the world food program, the partner against hunger and famine to launch an effort called "together for child vitality" that's helped to feed 80,000 children and encouraged them to come to school because they get food in school throughout kenya, indonesia. deforstation, school nutrition, improved food products for families, and efforts to literally transform the final frontier in food and agriculture in africa. there was a time a few decades ago when we celebrated the insights of a scientist who had invented new wheat seed varieties and in doing so, coupled that invention with his

persistence to end hunger and we awarded him the nobel peace prize for that effort. tonight's award is not the nobel peace prize, but in many ways, paul poleman reminds me of what i have learned and when i had the chance to meet the doctor, someone who has tremendous vision and intellect and respected for his leadership in a hard-nosed corporate environment, and someone who miraculously gets up every day, commits his personal time and energy, and somehow manages to bring 20, 30, 40 other ceos along with him every time he launches a new effort to make the world a better place and to imagine an environment when the kids don't go to bed hungry every night. for that, i'm deeply honored to introduce my friend paul poleman and to present him with the atlantic council's distinguished business leader award.

thank you, paul. [ applause ]

>> thanks. i think that's more than certainly i deserve. but one of the things that's very clear is that his leader of u.s. aid and obviously a deeper sense of purpose, focus and energy that he brings to a number of these global challenges is obviouslily admirable and to the benefit of us us a awl. no one better to explain that than him himself. i saw some of that determination when i had the privilege to work with him at the latest forum which i co-chaired and we worked on agriculture as a partnership to promote what we call the southern growth corridor in tanzania. it's an honor obviously for me to accept this award for our company, unilever and do this at

a time you celebrate 50 years of transatlantic relations and to foster peace and understanding across the world. in fact, i myselffact, i, mysel in some ways a child of the transatlantic council. i was born in the netherlands, grew up in europe, studied in the united states and had the privilege to lead the company which toughs about 2 billion lives a day. these formative years in the u.s. when i studies a few things have taught me the value of hard work how you appreciate the enterprise itself, the importance of strengths through diversity as well as the agility and the list goes on. it taught me that the economic environment was going to be

easy. when i say this privilege of the leadership roles also roles we need to make that comes with that. i'm very privileged to have my wife, that she's with me and sorry to say that most of the time we have to speak is on the plane when we go somewhere. so i want to thank her for everything and i couldn't do that without her. i also want to thank my mother-in-law. the widow of the late -- >> a personal sacrifice we make as the leaders in business is nothing compared to the price for peace and stability. to award on an evening when you actually recognize the men and

women. i'm accepting this award at a critical time for business. capitalism as we know it is being questioned at a time when trust in corporations and governments is in a goal. yet the need for businesses has probably never been good. the world faces many challenges that, food security being one of them. the social and economic development for all. the scarcity of food, water and energy remits what many experts are calling a perfect storm. and another 2 billion people will be entering this world in the coming 30 years. it is clear that we do have to act before it is too late and yet we face a dilemma. in fact, forgive me as a business person, i put it in terms of supplying demand. in fact, the demand for change

from citizens is growing. in fact, they're screaming out for it and social media is increasingly giving them a force actually in these demands. and at the same time t ability of governments and others to simply, to supply the changes that are needed is increasingly limited. now, i believe that business has an opportunity and the responsibility to step up and give. i always like to call victor frankel, that when they built the statue of liberty on the east coast of the united states, they forgot to build a statue of reasonability on the west coast and i think that is true for all of us. now we have a historic opportunity to strengthen the confidence of the citizens and to reverse this mistrust that exists that mistrust towards. >> michele: bizarand to show th

capitalism isn't dead. to try to give -- in this respect, put sustainable and respectable growth at the heart of our business and we've set our ambitions high. we want to double the size of our business, but at the same time, leave our entire mental footprint. we want to decouple the impacts on this environment. no company are a size or complexity of the goals, yet this new model of sustainable and equitable long-term growth is needed for a sustainable living plan. we have 60 time bomb targets covering the entire value chain and that will hopefully reduce the imact and improve the lives of millions of people around the world. especially the many that go to bed hungry as russia or the many people that are what we call small home farmers.

we want to save lives. it simply cannot be right that even in today's world, millions of children die from things like diarrhea when the answer lies in simple hand washing. it simply cannot be right that one child dies every six seconds and that a billion people go to bed hungry every night. therefore, i'm very pleased that the secretary general is here and will certainly call for encoursing his initiatives of every woman, every child and scaling up nutrition. one year on, we are start tog see real progress. because others are rallying to the cause. we cannot do it alone. we've always said power come frs collective action. so when for example, the world's major retailers and global consumers put an end to

deforestation, begin to move the needle. i know there's a growing p appetite for the agenda. we need to bring the u.s. of his leadership. the ingenuity -- we hope that the u.s. government at the conference and we need europeans to join the u.s. because together, you compromise the largest markets in the world for a long time to come and you set the example. the leadership we need to work in partnership with business, multilateral institutions and biggest challenges. ban ki-moon and shah understand this well to make, break down these institutional barriers we

have -- potentially one of the biggest challenges we have which is food security. it's a privilege to lead the private sector on these issues ahead of the upcoming g-20. if we're serious about lifting people out of poverty, stimulating economic development and if we're serious about these stabilizing effects that come from foot shortages, we have to act now. business simply has to take the leap. but it requires a new way to a new business model and we used to talk about business getting a license to operate. i don't think any longer. today, the challenge for business is to earn a commission to leave. the world needs it, the consumers demand it. we can't make these challenges to governments alone. business simply has to step up.

as one of the greatest countries here on earth that you are, most influential as well, one of your founding father, benjamin franklin, that you may delay, but time will not and lost time is is never found again. at uinleaver, we're trying earn the permission to lead. it is the journey in which the men and women who work for our wonderful institution are committed. and there we have in mind, i certainly thank you for acknowledging that this evening and for giving us this presentation this evening as well. i'm deeply honored and thank you for your time. now we turn to the distinguished humanitarian

award. you know, this is the first time that prince harry has been in washington, d.c. that is news making. >> i think we need someone really big. >> who could it be? who could it be? >> someone, i don't know. like a true american hero. >> a true american hero like general colin powell. now, of course, we're calling here the breath of general powell's career can take up a great part of this evening, so i'll simply say as a soldier and strategist, as a diplomat and statesman, he has by the way of his achievements and dedication of his provided inspiration around the world and he is a man, i'm editorial iizinging he, that my republican party could sure use instructing it on foreign policy decisions. >> maybe just a little. you might be right about