Climate change: The next financial crisis?

Climate change: The next financial crisis?
Copyright Reuters
By Isabelle Kumar
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Euronews' Isabelle Kumar hosts a panel discussion at the World Economic Forum Annual Meeting of the New Champions.

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Every year, Davos heads east as the World Economic Forum holds the Annual Meeting of the New Champions in Dalian, China.

This year, for the first time, Euronews moderated a session at what is colloquially known as the "summer" Davos.

It focused on the correlation between climate change and the possibility of another global financial crisis. The speakers on the panel brought a wide range of experience and insight.

They were Pradeep Kumar Gyawali, Nepal's Minister of foreign of affairs; Veronica Scotti, Chairperson Public Sector solutions for Swiss Re; Jean-Pierre Bourguignon, President of the European Research Council, Daphne Cheng, Founder and CEO of Superhuman, and Paul Ellis, Executive chairman of Electron.

Watch Euronews' Isabelle Kumar moderate the panel in the video player below.

Although there is clearly no silver bullet to mitigate the economic impact of climate change there was a consensus that while long term planning is required immediate action is essential.

One important message from the discussion: investment is key and with concerted planning, a financial crash borne from climate change is not an inevitability - indeed, even tackling climate change can become an economic opportunity.

Daphne Cheng, who is an advocate of a vegan diet, made a strong business case for investing in companies supporting sustainable agriculture describing this as a "kodak moment".

Victoria Scotti spoke about the potential of impact investment and the trillions that could be made available.

Paul Ellis highlighted easy solutions such as insulating homes in terms of stimulating growth in the green industry but also mitigating the effects of climate change.

Jean-Pierre Bourguignon discussed the implementation of climate change solutions and that these must be developed by investing in research even if this involves risk — implementation could be developed and transferred locally and then applied on a broader and potentially on a global scale.

Pradeep Kumar Gyawali, Nepal's foreign affairs minister provided a stark reminder that while theoretical discussion on the scale of the correlation between climate change and the global economy is important - climate inaction is being felt now as people in his country succumb to its effects and see their livelihoods destroyed.

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