Readying for the marathon: Reflections on WEF Davos Agenda Day One

The World Economic Forum’s Davos meetings – including this year’s Davos Agenda virtual meeting – are very well timed. They are, in many ways, a strategic staging area where we ready for the marathon before us.

With complex global issues from pandemic recovery to climate change and resetting economic and social systems on our shared horizon – and on the WEF agenda – progress will require the perseverance, long-term outlook and grit that marathons mandate.

For those committed to building to a reset via better business and genuine private-public partnerships, the Davos discussions sharpen our focus and crystallise opportunities and actions for the year ahead.

This coming week provides a platform for business, political and societal leaders the world over to better understand the complex global and regional challenges we face, to learn from experts and front-liners alike, and to work towards the best possible and most relevant solutions for our individual circumstances.

Over the next few days, I’ll be sharing some of what stands out to me from this year’s Davos Agenda meetings.

Here are some highlights from Day One:

• I appreciated the perspective from Bob Moritz, Global Chairman of PwC, about the metrics and standards we create and align our businesses towards as we work towards a more inclusive future. The abundance of measures that exist means scale and adaptability – and therefore success – are in question. “Every organisation and country doing its own thing is not giving us the scale required to deal with the enormity of the problem, be it climate, education or something else,” Moritz said. This discussion around the convergence of ESG metrics is important and one that we are deeply involved in and committed to.
• AstraZeneca CEO Pascal Soriot hit the nail on the head when he said ‘We’re only safe when everyone is safe’ of Covid global rates and testing. The session on building crisis-resistant healthcare systems in the post-pandemic world focused on the need to rethink how we see health an asset to invest in, not a cost to minimise. Currently, however, only 3% of global health spend is allocated to disease prevention. The panelists agreed that optimising where healthcare is delivered – not only through hospitals – is crucial in the fight against the pandemic. We have seen this work very well here in the Middle East, particularly in the UAE where our shopping malls have also served as testing centres and locations for clinics, allowing for enhanced accessibility and convenience.

More to come….