The Board of Directors of the United Nations Association of New York invite you to celebrate
The 2014 United Nations Day Humanitarian Awards Gala Dinner
Celebrating the 69th Anniversary of the United Nations
Empowering Women: Promoting Peace and Progress
Wednesday, October 29, 2014
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J. W. Marriott Essex House
160 Central Park South,
New York City
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Cocktail Hour | 6:30 p.m.
Dinner Program | 7:30 p.m.
Black Tie or National Dress
2 0 1 4 H O N O R E E S
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H&M
STEFAN PERSSON, Chairman
and the Persson Family
Honored for investing in and strengthening women
in developing countries and helping transform their lives,
fulfill their potential and realize their dreams
UN Women
PHUMZILE MLAMBO-NGCUKA, Executive Director
UN Under Secretary-General
Honored for extraordinary commitment to
gender equality and the empowerment
and advancement of women throughout the world
Lord Raj Loomba, CBE
Founder and Chairman,
The Loomba Foundation
LIFETIME ACHIEVEMENT AWARD
Honored for promoting the welfare and economic
empowerment of disadvantaged widows and educating
their children
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M A S T E R O F C E R E M O N I E S
Richard Lui
Anchor, MSNBC
2014 HUMANITARIAN AWARD HONOREE
H&M
Stefan Persson, Chairman
and the Persson Family
Stefan Persson is the Chairman of the Board of H&M Hennes & Mauritz AB, a global fashion company offering customers fashion and quality at the best price under several brands, in 3,300 stores in 55 countries, and online. Mr. Persson took over as Chairman of H&M in 1998 after having served as President and CEO since 1982. From 1976, he was the country manager for H&M in the UK and responsible for H&M's international expansion.
Founded in Sweden by Erling Persson in 1947, H&M today employs more than 116,000 people, of whom 77 percent are women. By contributing to international trade, H&M also helps to create more than a million jobs, not least for women in the textile industry in Asia, where H&M's sustainability work is dedicated to long-term development. In addition, the non-profit H&M Conscious Foundation — with the support from the Persson family — works together with the humanitarian organization CARE to empower women in some of the world's poorest communities, as well as with UNICEF and WaterAid.
Mr. Persson is also the founder and Chairman of the Board of the Erling-Persson Family Foundation, which supports research in natural and social sciences. His dedication has also been vital to the creation and development of the Stockholm School of Entrepreneurship.
Mr. Persson has received honorary doctorates at The Stockholm School of Economics; medical university Karolinska Institutet; and KTH Royal Institute of Technology.
He has been awarded the King's Medal of the Twelfth Dimension with the Ribbon of the Order of the Seraphim, for excellent efforts in Swedish trade issues.
2014 HUMANITARIAN AWARD HONOREE
UN Women
Phumzile Mlambo-Ngcuka,
Executive Director
Phumzile Mlambo-Ngcuka is United Nations Under-Secretary-General and Executive Director of UN Women. She was sworn into office on 19 August 2013 and brings a wealth of experience and expertise to this position, having devoted her career to issues of human rights, equality and social justice. Ms. Mlambo-Ngcuka has worked in government and civil society, and with the private sector, and was actively involved in the struggle to end apartheid in her home country of South Africa.
From 2005 to 2008, she served as Deputy President of South Africa, overseeing programmes to combat poverty and bring the advantages of a growing economy to the poor, with a particular focus on women. Prior to this, she served as Minister of Minerals and Energy from 1999 to 2005 and Deputy Minister in the Department of Trade and Industry from 1996 to 1999. She was a Member of Parliament from 1994 to 1996 as part of South Africa's first democratic government.
Ms. Mlambo-Ngcuka began her career as a teacher and gained international experience as a coordinator at the World YWCA in Geneva, where she established a global programme for young women. She is the founder of the Umlambo Foundation, which supports leadership and education. A longtime champion of women's rights, she is affiliated with several organizations devoted to education, women's empowerment and gender equality.
She has completed her PhD on education and technology at the University of Warwick, United Kingdom.
2014 LIFETIME ACHIEVEMENT AWARD
Lord Raj Loomba, CBE
Founder and Chairman
The Loomba Foundation
Lord Loomba, CBE is Founder and Chairman of the Loomba Foundation, a UN accredited global NGO, which promotes the fundamental freedoms and human rights of widows and their children around the world.
He is widely known today as the Pioneer of Widows' Rights and Instigator of International Widows Day. In June 2013, UN Women named Lord Loomba as the first Founding Champion of the circle of Widows Rights.
Lord Loomba received a CBE in 2008 and was elevated to the House of Lords as a Liberal Democrats Life Peer in 2011. In November 2012, he received an NRI Philanthropy award from Forbes India, and in 2014, he received an Honorary Fellowship from the Northampton University.
Lord Loomba's campaigning achievements are founded on his successful business career, as founder of Rinku Group, the fashion and clothing company, of which he is Executive Chairman.
In memory of his late mother, Lord Loomba set up the Shrimati Pushpa Wati Loomba Foundation as a charitable Foundation in 1997. Lord Loomba is a tireless campaigner for improving the plight of widows and their children all over the world.
To date, the Foundation has educated over 9000 children of poor widows in all 29 states in India, who have received scholarships for five years or more and supported over 38,000 family members. The Foundation is currently educating over 2,500 children in 16 states in India.
MASTER OF CEREMONIES
RICHARD LUI
Richard Lui anchors MSNBC News on weekdays from 10 a.m. until noon, breaking down the nation's most compelling issues of the day. He joined MSNBC's dayside team in September 2010.
Before joining MSNBC, Lui spent five years at CNN Worldwide, most recently with CNN Headline News as the solo anchor of the 10 a.m. hour of "Morning Express." He also led the network's morning political reporting throughout the 2008 presidential election. Lui anchored and reported on all of CNN Worldwide's English-language networks including CNN US, CNN International, and HLN.
Lui's field work includes reporting in Africa and Asia on global issues such as defense systems, terrorism, human trafficking, SARS, and Bird Flu. In 2010, he traveled to the Gulf to report extensively on the oil spill cleanup, an industry in which he spent five years working professionally. In addition, Lui brings a 15-year career in international business that spans five industries including consulting, manufacturing, food and beverage, environmental, and technology fields, spending the 90s in Silicon Valley.
He has spent 25 years in community service, volunteering in Africa, Asia, and the United States for organizations like Habitat for Humanity and the YMCA. He serves as a pro bono strategy consultant and board member for non-profits involved with homeless and affordable housing.
Lui graduated with a bachelor's degree in rhetoric from UC Berkeley and holds an MBA from the Ross School of Business at the University of Michigan. He currently is enrolled at Stanford University pursuing a Graduate Certificate in International Security.
Read about and see photos from
The 2013 Humanitarian Awards Dinner
2014 CORPORATE SPONSORS
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2014 DINNER INVITATIONS
Download the Dinner Invitation here
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