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Press Release

ROTARIANS MEET BILL GATES AT WORLD LEADERS LUNCH

30th January 2008

Allan Jagger President of Rotary International in Great Britain and Ireland, and Member of the Rotary $100 Million Challenge Committee, today met Bill Gates at the IoD World Leaders Lunch in London. Accompanied by Past Rotary International Director and Member of the RI Polio Plus Committee, Keith Barnard Jones and Judith Diment, Rotary’s Public Relations Consultant. Allan took the opportunity to thank Mr Gates on behalf of Rotarians in Great Britain and Ireland for the donations from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation for the Rotary Polio Eradication programme.

The Rotary Foundation received a $100-million Gates Foundation grant in November 2007, which Rotary will raise funds to match, dollar-for-dollar, over three years. The Evanston-based volunteer service organization will spend the initial $100 million within one year in direct support of immunization activities carried out by the Global Polio Eradication Initiative (GPEI), a partnership spearheaded by the World Health Organization (WHO), Rotary International, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and UNICEF.

"The extraordinary dedication of Rotary members has played a critical role in bringing polio to the brink of eradication,” says Bill Gates, co-chair of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. “Eradicating polio will be one of the most significant public health accomplishments in history, and we are committed to helping reach that goal."

The polio eradication grant is one of the largest challenge grants ever given by the Gates Foundation and the largest grant received by Rotary in its 102-year history. Polio eradication has been Rotary’s top priority since 1985. Since then, Rotary has contributed $633 million to the eradication effort.

At the World Leaders Lunch Bill Gates was interviewed about his leadership style, his rise at Microsoft from humble beginnings to the creation of one of the world’s most successful organisations. He outlined his vision for future IT innovations and also participated in a questions from the floor session with more than 1000 business people attending the event. He discussed his other passions such as his global health and education work and the relationship of philanthropy and business.



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