Latvia, Markets and Companies, Press-release, USA

The American Chamber of Commerce elected four new members to its Board of Directors:

• Romāns Baumanis, Government relations and Public affairs Consultant and Regional Advisor to Nord-Stream in the Baltic States;
• Matthew Hadley, Partner of Advisory services, KPMG Baltics;
• Ilze Jurkāne, Former Vice President of GE Money Bank;
• Matīss D. Kukainis, Attorney at Law and Partner, Spīgulis & Kukainis Law Office.

The board members are elected to serve two years terms. The voting took place at the Chamber’s 16^th Annual General Meeting at the Hotel Bergs. 

Charge d’Affaires of the U.S. Embassy in Latvia Bruce Rogers opened the meeting with a speech, stressing the close cooperation AmCham Latvia has with the U.S. Embassy in Riga. One of the key priorities of the Embassy is to help broaden and strengthen the economic growth between Latvia and the United States.

Jerry Wirth, President of the Chamber of Commerce, outlined the Chamber’s accomplishments of the past year and goals for the next year. During 2008 the Chamber has continued to develop as a professional business organization, organizing numerous events, publishing its magazine, member bulletin, membership directory and continuing to maintain the high quality of its website www.amcham.lv.

In 2008 AmCham Board initiated the development of Good Corporate Citizenship working group whose mandate was to work out and implement the statement on Good Corporate Citizenship. The working group considered the existing statements from respected international organizations and companies as examples.

The goal of this initiative is to foster an improvement in Latvia’s business environment. The statement consists of a belief statement and corporate principles for businesses. It focuses on the four main areas:

• Transparency and Ethics
• Human Resources
• Philanthropy
• The Environment

Signatories will be collected voluntary from existing members and published on AmCham website. Each new member of the Chamber will be required to sign the statement for entry into AmCham.

Today the statement was officially signed by the following AmCham member companies and individuals: Architectural Investments; Aon Latvia; Valdis Bērziņš; Hotel Bergs; Cisco Latvia; City Express; Diatom Enterprises; FranklinCovey Latvia; C&K Travel Consulting; Ernst & Young Baltic; Exigen Services; IBM Latvija; JL Baltic; Johnson & Johnson AB filiale Latvijā; Junior Achievement–Young Enterprise Latvia; Ilze Jurkane; Ingrida Karina-Berzina; Key Capital; KLT Legal & Tax; Klavins & Slaidins LAWIN; Coalition for Gender Equality in Latvia; Marsh; Parex Bank; R.B. Management; Radisson SAS Daugava Hotel; Stockholm School of Economics in Riga; Ronald McDonald House Charities Latvija; RTU Riga Business School; Skrivanek Latvia; Smart Move; Uve Zosars Taxation & Business Consulting.

The American Chamber of Commerce in Latvia is one of the oldest and largest business organizations in the Baltics, and the second oldest American Chamber of Commerce in Eastern Europe. The Chamber was founded in 1993 by 27 American investors.

In addition to the four Board members voted in, the Board consists of Aleksis J. Karlsons, Member of the Board, SIA Hotel Bergs, Chairman of the Board and Co-Owner, SIA A&E Consulting; Alexander Sasha Kelberg, CEO of GroGlass, a high technology manufacturing facility and NCH investment Investment Manager, NCH; Ivars Slokenbergs, Associate, Klavins & Slaidins Attorneys at Law; Jerry Wirth, Chamber President and Partner of RBM Group and Liga Bertulsone, Executive Director.