Full disclosure: the headline of this column, 'Supply Chain Saves the World,' isn't original. AMR Research, the Boston-based firm that has made its reputation as a leading consultant in the space where IT and process operations converge, used it as the theme of their recent Supply Chain Executive Conference. The Big Idea embodied within, that business is entering a new phase in its global evolution, is so compelling that I have shamelessly stolen the title.

The evolution of 'techno-ops'-beginning in the 1990s when emphasis shifted from hardware to software-aptly underscores the significance of the re-positioning currently underway. Original investments in ERP, when they failed to produce expected benefits, prompted broader concern for the entire supply chain; soon thereafter came the Internet, effectively putting that supply chain on steroids. Now for the past five years following the dot.com bust, production capital has replaced speculative financial capital in driving advances-meaning that returns get embedded in the enterprise and not in Wall Street IPOs.

So how does all this lead to changing the world?

To understand, it's necessary to set the context within which global business will be conducted in the future. Certain broad trends are clear: in the developed countries birth rates are low, work forces are in net decline, key manufacturing industries are approaching maturity. Growth opportunities are in emerging markets-and, in emerging sectors like green and nano technology, alternative energy, and health. Meanwhile, critical problems-climate change, terrorism, resource depletion-have to be addressed or we're all toast.

Given these sets of challenges, it would be easy to be a defeatist. But, the mood at this conference was just the opposite. Instead, there was confidence in the capacity of corporate enterprise to respond to these situations as both market opportunities and social responsibilities. Such hope wasn't expressed as an act of faith but rather an appreciation for how emerging networks of integrated supply chains possess the potential to unleash unprecedented powers of innovation and productivity.

Putting a fine point on this conversation was Bill Clinton, who spoke extemporaneously to the collected gathering for well over an hour about his personal mission these days: “solving problems, saving lives, helping people see the future.” As he described the work being done to this end by his foundation, The Clinton Global Initiative, he continually repeated his central message that lots more worldwide well being can be generated by better deploying existing capital through more efficient channels of delivery-which, in deference to the audience and with the sly flattery of a natural politician, he suggested might be a pretty fair working definition of the supply chain.

“The 21st century for me isn't about 'globalization,'” he explained. “It's about inter-dependence.” In its positive iteration, this translates into partnerships, alliances, collaborations and exchanges of intellectual capital (the negative side, on the other hand, is dark and dire). “Intelligence and hard work are evenly distributed throughout the planet,” Clinton insisted. “What isn't evenly distributed is opportunity and the capability to seize it.” Such imbalances, he concluded, “make the world unstable and unequal.”

Clinton and the AMR folks argue that redressing those imbalances can be the stuff of good business, of 'doing well by doing good.' How effectively companies are able to deploy their supply chains to more equitably allocate access to information, capital and innovation in under-served markets is going to be critical to the future of the enterprise. And, perhaps humanity itself.