Citi’s Sustainable Ocean Economy Series – Launch: Charting a Prosperous Blue Future from Risk to Resilience

Healthy oceans are important for our planet, society, and the global economy. As such, ocean sustainability requires increased attention and action from businesses and financial institutions and a more integrated approach across climate change, biodiversity and ocean health. Almost all industries contribute to ocean health decline through stressors including climate change, pollution, and land/sea use change and direct exploitation. The report serves as a primer on the business case for ocean action and engagement.

The Citi GPS Food Security report looks at the current state of the world with relation to food insecurity and hunger. Food security is typically caused by three main factors: environmental disaster, conflict, and social, political, or economic shifts. In 2022, we find ourselves in a perfect storm of all three. While some of these factors may be alleviated in 2023, their effects will take time to work through. We examine the potential solutions to alleviate current food insecurity and prevent or lessen the severity of future occurrences, looking at four categories: social, technological , public sector, and financial/economic solutions.

Although there is much in the world to be proud of, we still face enormous societal, environmental, and economic challenges. Even in this day and age, more than 2 billion people — a quarter of all humankind — lack access to even the most basic elements of life that most of us take for granted, such as clean water, sanitation, and energy, while 800 million people — more than one in ten of us — remain undernourished. At its most extreme, the picture is infinitely worse; 700 million people, again, almost one in ten of us, still live below the poverty line on less than $1.90 per day, a sum that many of us spend on a coffee without a second thought. More than 40% of children younger than age 14 (800 million) still lack access to a 'complete' education, and are denied the opportunity to reach their full potential. Beyond the obvious impact on their own lives, what benefits might almost a billion extra well-educated people bring to the world?