Risk ranking in 2021

The “Global Risks Report 2021” released by the World Economic Forum (WEF) ahead of its annual Davos’ meetings, alerts this year of the severity of the Covid-19 crisis and its multiple ramifications will become a major challenge in the coming years. They will shape the effectiveness of our response to other future key risks such as cyberattacks, weapons of mass destruction and, most notably, climate change”.

The report reveals the magnitude of the crisis caused by the pandemic: “the immediate human and economic cost of COVID-19 is severe and threatens to scale back years of progress on reducing poverty and inequality and to further weaken social cohesion and global cooperation”.

It also remarks how the Covid -19 crisis spillover effects will become a major challenge in the coming years affecting decisively the way other key risks will be managed: “The ramifications—in the form of social unrest, political fragmentation and geopolitical tensions—will shape the effectiveness of our responses to the other key threats of the next decade: cyberattacks, weapons of mass destruction and, most notably, climate change”.

This year risk´s rankings is dominated by climate-related matters described by the report as “an existential threat to humanity”.

The report highlights many other categories of global risks, including the following:

• Among the most likely risks in the coming ten years we have: extreme weather, climate action failure and human-led environmental damage; as well as digital power concentration, digital inequality and cybersecurity failure.
• The most imminent threats (in the next two years) are unemployment and livelihood crises, widespread youth disillusionment, digital inequality, economic stagnation, human-made environmental damage, erosion of societal cohesion and terrorist attacks.
• Economic risks will be relevant in the next 3-5 years, including asset bubbles, price instability, commodity shocks and debt crises; followed by geopolitical risks, including interstate relations and conflict, and resource geopolitization.