As per the World Economic Forum’s Global Competitiveness Report 2017-2018 even a decade after the global financial crisis, economies are still at risk and are ill-prepared to face the next wave of innovation and automation. There has been a failure by leaders and policymakers to put in place reforms needed to fortify competitiveness and raise productivity.

The financial system is yet to recover from the shock of 2007 and is declining further in some parts of the world. This is worrying as it plays a key role in facilitating investment in innovation related to the fourth industrial revolution.

Moreover, there is a need to create conditions to withstand economic shock and support workers through transition periods with vast numbers of jobs set to be disrupted due to automation and robotics. Third, the imbalance between investments in technology and efforts to promote its adoption throughout the wider economy needs to be addressed as those lead to failure of innovation to ignite productivity. Switzerland is the most competitive economy, narrowly ahead of the United States and Singapore, for the ninth consecutive year. Other G20 economies in the top ten list are Germany, the United Kingdom and Japan. China tops among the BRICS group of large emerging markets. These are the findings of the Global Competitiveness Report 2017-2018.