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UN Sec-Gen warns of unacceptable risk of disasters… Business at risk from lack of engagement with employees… Oil prices have potentially global implications for political unrest…

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UN Sec-Gen warns of unacceptable risk of disasters
The Secretary-General of the United Nations has warned that the world faces increased risks that could reach an unacceptable level. Ban Ki-moon spoke as the organization launched its 2015 Global Report on Disaster Risk Reduction and said:  “growing global inequality, increasing exposure to natural hazards, rapid urbanization and the overconsumption of energy and natural resources threaten to drive risk to dangerous and unpredictable levels with systemic global impacts.” 

Citing climate change as a major cause of risk, he said that if we don’t act now a tipping point will be reached rendering solutions outside the capacity of future generations. The new report estimates that an investment of US$6 billion annually in disaster risk management would result in avoided losses of US$360 billion over the next 15 years. The report states that this US$6 billion is just 0.1% of total forecast expenditure of US$6 trillion annually on new infrastructure.
 
Business at risk from lack of engagement with employees
Many organizations are failing to take action to improve their corporate culture and are jeopardizing future growth. That’s according to a new global report by Deloitte which says that lack of engagement with employees is the biggest issue facing HR and business leaders. The proportion of managers who say that employee engagement is important has doubled to 50 per cent in Deloitte’s latest poll, however 60 per cent say they don’t have an adequate program to measure engagement of staff and only 7 per cent regard themselves as excellent at measuring, driving and improving engagement and retention. “As demand for talent picks up, the balance of power in business is rapidly shifting from the employer to the employee,” said Josh Bersin, principal and founder of Bersin by Deloitte, “In this new world of work, organizations need to re-imagine the way they manage people and come up with new, out-of-the-box ideas to make themselves relevant.”
 
Oil prices have potentially global implications for political unrest
AON Risk Solutions has published its Political Risk Map highlighting the many areas of the world where there is increased risk of political unrest and instability. Heading the list are the oil producing nations of Iran, Iraq, Libya, Russia and Venezuela as a consequence of the low oil price. The report concludes that these regions could suffer from strengthened extremist groups if they are not able to absorb economic shocks. Russia and its neighbors are also considered as more risky again due to oil prices but also as a result of sanctions and increased tension. See the risk map.

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