Fighting in Gaza and Ukraine, rising temperatures and trade disruptions – along with fears of AI-driven falsehoods during an important year of elections around the globe – top the list of priorities for global elites to discuss at the World Economic Forum's annual gathering.
WEF's widely ridiculed talkfest among some 2,800 political leaders, billionaires, CEOs, academics, journalists and other attendees from 120 countries that opened on Monday in the Swiss resort town of Davos will have to get at the "root causes" of all these major challenges to be considered a success, according to WEF's leader.
Still, the weeklong blur of public and closed-door sessions held through Friday is expected to draw more than 60 heads of state and government, notably Israeli President Isaac Herzog and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy.
In a plea for more international support on Tuesday, Zelenskyy said Russia's President Vladimir Putin will only be stopped by military defeat. “Anyone thinks this is only about us, this is only about Ukraine, they are fundamentally mistaken,” he said.
Other prominent leaders expected to attend include Chinese Premier Li Qiang, French President Emmanuel Macron, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, U.N. Secretary-General António Guterres, Argentinian President Javier Milei, South Korean President Han Duck-soo, Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez and U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken.
"We’re determined to sustain our support for [Ukraine], and we’re working very closely with Congress in order to do that. I know our European colleagues are doing the same thing," Blinken told Zelenskyy before their meeting in Davos.
Despite the disdain it draws as a symbol of the privileged rich and powerful making out-of-touch decisions, the meeting's wintry tight quarters provide opportunity for myriad face-to-face interactions not easily found elsewhere.
“We face a fractured world and growing societal divides, leading to pervasive uncertainty and pessimism," said WEF's executive chairman and founder, Klaus Schwab, a German-born economist and engineer.
"We have to rebuild trust in our future by moving beyond crisis management, looking at the root causes of the present problems, and building together a more promising future,” he said.
The nearly 2-year-old Russian full-scale invasion of Ukraine and Israel’s three-month war with Hamas in Gaza are the top geopolitical crises, along with U.S. and British airstrikes on Houthi militants in Yemen that fired missiles disrupting the Red Sea shipping lanes.
The Israel-Hamas war is fueling Red Sea tensions, said Qatar's Prime Minister Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al Thani, so “we should focus on the main conflict in Gaza, and as soon as it’s defused, I believe everything else will be defused."
Other priorities include uncertainty over December's U.N. climate summit, where nations agreed for the first time they would start “transitioning away from fossil fuels in energy systems, in a just, orderly and equitable manner," and the growing promise and threat of artificial intelligence in the information landscape.
Little more than a year since OpenAI’s ChatGPT began its dizzying ascent to mass adoption, OpenAI chief Sam Altman and his corporate allies at Microsoft will find themselves magnets for discussion at Davos.
The theme for WEF's 54th annual meeting that begins on Monday is “rebuilding trust” through the principles of transparency, coherence and responsibility.
229 years until poverty is eradicated
AI-powered misinformation and disinformation that are polarizing and erode democracy pose the most severe short-term risks to the global economy, while extreme weather and changes to the Earth's life support systems are the greatest long-term concerns, according to WEF's Global Risks Report 2024.
The conclusions – reflecting the recent spread in the use of generative AI chatbots like ChatGPT to those who don't have specialized IT skills – are based on a survey of almost 1,500 experts, industry leaders and policymakers.
The timing also reflects the elections slated to be held in 2024 among nations such as India, Mexico, Pakistan, the United Kingdom and the United States.
AI is set to affect almost 40% of all jobs around the world, according to a new analysis by the International Monetary Fund. Because of AI's ability to impact high-skilled jobs, IMF says, advanced economies face greater risks but also more opportunities to leverage its benefits compared to emerging market and developing economies.
"We are on the brink of a technological revolution that could jumpstart productivity, boost global growth and raise incomes around the world. Yet it could also replace jobs and deepen inequality," said IMF Managing director Kristalina Georgieva.
Another new report pegged to the start of the Davos gathering showed the world’s five richest men as of the end of Nov. 2023 – Elon Musk, Bernard Arnault and family, Jeff Bezos, Larry Ellison and Warren Buffett – more than doubled their fortunes from US$405 billion to US$869 billion since 2020, at a rate of $14 million per hour. Nearly 5 billion people grew poorer during that time.
Oxfam International's report about inequality and global corporate power on Monday said a billionaire is now in charge or the main shareholder of 70% of the world's biggest companies. "If current trends continue, the world will have its first trillionaire within a decade but poverty won’t be eradicated for another 229 years," Oxfam concluded.
The anti-poverty organization estimated 148 companies made US$1.8 trillion in profits, up 52% on a 3-year average, while millions of workers lost purchasing power due to inflation. It called for governments to rein in corporate power by taxing excess profit and wealth and breaking up monopolies.
“We’re witnessing the beginnings of a decade of division, with billions of people shouldering the economic shockwaves of pandemic, inflation and war, while billionaires’ fortunes boom," said Amitabh Behar, Oxfam's interim executive director. "This inequality is no accident; the billionaire class is ensuring corporations deliver more wealth to them at the expense of everyone else."
This story has been updated with additional details.
