Situation Report

CLICK HERE - HOME - The Global Risks Report 2018

World Economic Forum - weforum.org - 2018

Each year the Global Risks Report works with experts and decision-makers across the world to identify and analyze the most pressing risks that we face. As the pace of change accelerates, and as risk interconnections deepen, this year’s report highlights the growing strain we are placing on many of the global systems we rely on.

The Global Risks Report 2018 is published at a time of encouraging headline global growth. Any breathing space this offers to leaders should not be squandered: the urgency of facing up to systemic challenges has intensified over the past year amid proliferating signs of uncertainty, instability and fragility.

This year’s report covers more risks than ever, but focuses in particular on four key areas: environmental degradation, cybersecurity breaches, economic strains and geopolitical tensions. And in a new series called “Future Shocks” the report cautions against complacency and highlights the need to prepare for sudden and dramatic disruptions.

People collect drinking water from pipes fed by an underground spring in St. James, about 25 kilometers from the city center of Cape Town.

cnn.com - by Paul P. Murphy - January 24, 2018

In Cape Town, South Africa, they're calling it "Day Zero" -- the day when the taps run dry.

A few days ago, city officials had said that day will come on April 22. This week, they moved up the date to April 12 . . . 

 . . . It's been a slow-motion crisis, exacerbated by three factors conspiring together:

The worst drought in over a century, which has pushed Cape Town's water scarcity into a potentially deadly horizon

Its population, which is 4 million and growing quickly

A rapidly changing climate

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CLICK HERE - Cape Town told to cut water use or face losing supply by 12 April

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thehill.com - by Peter Sullivan - January 19, 2018

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is planning to significantly reduce its overseas work to fight disease due to coming funding cutbacks, according to an internal email reported by The Wall Street Journal.

Unless it gets new funding, the CDC will be cutting down its work against diseases from 49 countries to 10 countries starting in October 2019, the Journal reported . . . 

 . . . The 10 countries where the CDC will continue its work are India, Thailand, Vietnam, Kenya, Uganda, Liberia, Nigeria, Senegal, Jordan and Guatemala, the Journal reported.

The CDC said it is starting to plan now to make transitions in the countries it cannot continue the work in.

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Visitors look at cars in the Ford booth at the North American International Auto Show in Detroit, Michigan, U.S. January 15, 2018. REUTERS/Jonathan Ernst

reuters.com - by Paul Lienert - January 15, 2018

Ford Motor Co’s plan to double its electrified vehicle spending is part of an investment tsunami in batteries and electric cars by global automakers that now totals $90 billion and is still growing, a Reuters analysis shows.

That money is pouring in to a tiny sector that amounts to less than 1 percent of the 90 million vehicles sold each year and where Elon Musk’s Tesla Inc, with sales of only three models totaling just over 100,000 vehicles in 2017, was a dominant player.

With the world’s top automakers poised to introduce dozens of new battery electric and hybrid gasoline-electric models over the next five years - many of them in China - executives continue to ask: Who will buy all those vehicles?

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