Key to deal business with Danes

Balan Moses is a veteran journalist with a keen interest in diplomacy.
Balan Moses is a veteran journalist with a keen interest in diplomacy.

A Malaysian columnist for the New Straits Times has suggested Malaysian companies the key to dealing business with their Danish counterparts: “It’s not just about profit.”

In an opinion piece published on the Times on Jan 6, Balan Moses stated that ethics played big roles for the Danes in making their business decisions as they are not “necessarily hinge on the profit” – alone.

Moses wrote that Danes set 3 bottomlines for themselves – “the environmental, the social, and, of course, profits” – when doing business. The principles, also by Danish Ambassador to Malaysian Nicolai Ruge’s account, are “intrinsic to most Danish business models as their way of giving back to the society.”

The most recent programme, Moses cited, is the cooperation between Danish pharmaceutical giant Novo Nordisk and the Malaysian government to reduce the diabetes rate among mothers and children in the country.

“These principles represent a set of against-the-grain policies willingly undertaken by a commercial entity that using conventional wisdom would rightly have been trying to cash in on the ever-growing rate of diabetes among Malaysians,” he wrote.

Moses is bewilded by the discovery which sets him to think of how this can filter down the ranks of businessmen in Malaysia. “Some of whom are still saddled by the belief that the only bottomline to business is money,” he wrote.

Today, there are more than 60 Danish companies operating in Malaysia – among them are some familiar names like Carlsberg, shipping giant Maersk, United Plantations Berhad, and Novo.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *