On Friday, January 21, 2022, His Excellency the Saudi Minister of Finance, Mr. Mohammed Al-Jadaan, participated in the virtual panel discussion organized by the World Economic Forum (Davos Agenda under the title: Building Future Preparedness. The session speakers from various background including Christian Mumenthaler, Group Chief Executive Officer, Swiss Re, Switzerland; International Business Council, Jeremy Farrar, Director, Wellcome Trust, United Kingdom, Odile Françoise Renaud-Basso, President, European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD), London, as well as Adam Tooze, Director, European Institute, Columbia University, USA, took part in this session.
In his opening speech, H.E the Minister of Finance highlighted that the past two years have provided many lessons to build economic resilience and a better future preparedness. Among these lessons is the need for a bold, decisive, data driven action in risk mitigation, while balancing public health, social, and economic needs simultaneously. He pointed out that the G20 members have agreed to establish a joint taskforce between the ministers of health and the ministers of finance to ensure that the world is better prepared for the future. It is very critical we support these efforts.
Al-Jaddan added that we learned a clear lesson from Covid-19 pandemic that it is not possible for one country to fight the pandemic alone. Any type of pandemic needs a greater international collaboration.
HE. added that energy transition and sustainable development are key enablers to build a resilient global economy, however the risk that is often overlooked is the need to ensure energy security is not negatively impacted through the energy transition.
Additionally. Al-Jadaan highlighted that G20 works with the World Bank, the International Monetary Fund and other multilateral institutions to find a way to better prepare for the potential future crises through continued structural reforms and risk management.
Al-Jadaan said, "In the past, it took years to produce vaccines, but today by the collective collaboration, both the private and government, we managed to move successfully and managed to provide support to low income countries. We were able to agree through the G20 and Paris Club to provide relief, and the IMF issued $650bn equivalent of SDRs to support liquidity"
Al-Jadaan confirmed that Saudi Arabia fully supports sustainability and resilience on the global stage while ensuring energy security. The need to transition to a green, sustainable global economy is imperative; however, a flexible and measured approach is required to ensure energy security and economic stability in the long term.
It is worth noting that the Davos Agenda is being held during the week that participants were meant to come together in Davos – 17-21 January 2022, hosting a series of virtual plenaries aligned with the Annual Meeting objective of orienting global leaders on the imperatives of the year ahead.