The small town is passing. It was the incubator that hatched all our big men, and that's why we haven't got as many big men today as we used to have. Take every small-town-raised leader out of business and you would have nobody left running it but vice-presidents.

America already holds the record for freak movements. Now we have a new one. It's called "Restoring Confidence." Rich men who never had a mission in life outside of watching a stock ticker are working day and night "restoring confidence." Writers are working night shifts, speakers' tables are littered up, ministers are preaching statistics, all on "restoring confidence."

Companies like YouTube will continue to be tested on their commitment to the mission that made them such popular and profitable websites - providing an open platform to a wide range of ideas from around the world.

Barack Obama was first elected after a period of profound failure by elite and government institutions, from finance to foreign policy to Hurricane Katrina, and his first term immediately and unapologetically enacted a flurry of government solutions.

The Dream Act and the DISCLOSE Act, to name two, had majorities in both chambers during Obama's first term, but they were filibustered to death. They probably await a similar fate unless the filibuster is reformed.

Here is one iron law of the Internet: a social network's emphasis on monetizing its product is directly proportional to its users' loss of privacy.

It's such a tough business. And once people see you a certain way, it's really hard for them to change their minds about you.

China has proven that the wellbeing of citizens in a country doesn't necessarily contradict its engagement globally.

The big part of coffee production in many rural areas is in the hands of women. It's women who work in the fields. They harvest the coffee. They wash the coffee. They take the coffee to the market. But when the coffee gets to the market, it's the man who cashes in the money for the crop.

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.

Governments can't credibly claim to be concerned about stagnant growth and ageing workforces unless they are actively seeking to empower women economically. One way they can speed up progress towards gender-equal economic opportunity is to change laws that are holding women back.

Laws matter. With effective implementation and enforcement, good laws can nudge forward positive changes in social and cultural mores.

Gender-based job restrictions tend to be associated with wider wage gaps and lower employment rates for women. And where girls' future earning potential is limited, families may choose to send their brothers to school instead.

ITC looks forward to working with the chief minister and the government of India to ensure trade leads to impact on the ground.

A.P., like the rest of India, has huge potential to move up the value chain by investing in small and medium enterprises to create more value addition and better paid jobs.

You must stand up for multilateralism. You must make trade great again.

Trade and investment promotion organizations are crucial partners in ITC's work to enable SMEs to internationalize. They sustain and multiply the impact of trade-related technical support and allow SMEs to function with confidence in any location.

E-commerce is a powerful means to connect the unconnected to global trade.

When women are paid for their work and have control over how the money gets spent, they invest much more of their income than men do in their families' education and health.

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

Women are the most underutilized 'resource' in the world economy.

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.

Women are the half of the engine of our societies; they are half of the engines of our economies.

The 'SheTrades' programme aims to connect one million women entrepreneurs to markets by 2020 with a campaign, a focussed networking app, and a range of international and national information resources.