On Thursday, 9 April and Friday, 10 April, the Future Proof Convention 2026 brought Europe's business leaders, sustainability pioneers and next-generation changemakers to the Jaarbeurs in Utrecht for two days of dialogue and commitment. We hosted two Leaders Summit sessions that cut to the heart of what future-proof business looks like.

The Link Between Nature and Business

Can businesses survive without a connection to nature? That was the opening question of Thursday morning's Leaders Summit session, moderated by Merei Wagenaar, Executive Director of UN Global Compact NL, and Lena Hülsmann, Co-Founder of The Overview Effect.

Marcel Beukeboom, Director of Naturalis Biodiversity Center, started the conversation by setting the scene: he explained how biodiversity loss is accelerating, and is driven by overconsumption, chemicals and pollution, and how every business leader in the room bears a share of responsibility. With half of the global economy depending directly on ecosystem services, the loss of biodiversity puts us great risk.

Monique Lempers, Chief Impact Officer at Fairphone, offered a way forward. She shared how Fairphone published their first-ever nature report in 2026, showing their effort of working toward validated targets under the Science Based Targets Network (SBTN) framework. Monique's message was that you don't need to have all the answers before you start. Dedicated attention with stakeholder involvement and the willingness to act, even when it costs more time and money, are what moves the needle.

"Biodiversity is too important to say it's too difficult." - Merei Wagenaar

We wrapped up the session with a short but powerful assignment: each participant wrote down their own "I will…" statement, about what they would individually do about the protection of nature and biodiversity. They wrote it on a small card to carry home, as a reminder that people can collectively create lasting change.

The Power of Procurement

On Friday, the Leaders Summit session shifted the conversation to supply chains and the importance of transparency for responsible business.

Merei Wagenaar and Firas Abdulhasain, Senior Programme Manager at UN Global Compact NL, led the session alongside Cecile van der Wilden from SDG Nederland. They spoke about the complexity of supply chains, and how they are full of risks that are being overlooked by most companies. Ignoring those risks does however not make them disappear, but causes someone else in the chain bear it, usually the most vulnerable stakeholders.

The conversation made clear that certification labels matter, but are not the answer on their own. Doing the real work means you have to show up in the hardest geographies, working in consortia with local and Dutch NGOs, and paying farmers a premium that makes genuine transparency possible. In Indonesia, most smallholder farmers are women who for years remained invisible to the supply chains that depended on them. Giving them a presence and a voice is what real transparency looks like.

The session closed on a simple but important conslusion. Sustainable procurement doesn't have a finish line. You have to approach it with a programme-mindset, rooted in ongoing due diligence and a commitment to the communities you depend on.

Community Talks at the Impact Trade Fair

Beyond the two sessions, we were present across the full two days at the Future of Work booth in the Impact Trade Fair, where we hosted a Work Lab dialogue on shaping the future of work, and closed the Friday afternoon with a UN Global Compact meet-up and networking drinks alongside SDG Nederland, Employees for our Future, Community Z, Enactus and Jonge Klimaatbeweging.