AMNC24 - Finding Growth amid Complex Risks

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Michael Wang, Anchor, Global Business and BizTalk, China Global Television Network (CGTN): OK. Welcome everyone to our conversation on finding growth amid complex risks. My name is Michael Wang. I am an anchor at China Global Television Network or CGTN. A warm welcome to everyone to the beautiful coastal city of Dalian. And hopefully – hopefully – that wonderful sea breeze can clear our minds a little bit; offer some clarity on such an important topic.

So I think in the world right now, we definitely see shoots of economic optimism but I think we can all agree that that optimism may be tempered by challenges in an interconnected set of very intricate and complex risks and that's hopefully what we are going to explore today.

How do we better navigate the complexity, these risks, to foster more resilient and more sustainable growth?

I want to draw everyone's attention first to the screens around you. So this is a visual from the World Economic Forum's May edition Chief Economist's Outlook. So, on the left side of this visual, you'll see the positive – the positive side of the ledger, the growth drivers in the next five years. Not surprisingly of course technological transformation; I see artificial intelligence; the green transition. These will be the positive forces that push growth forward in the next five years.

But unfortunately, we have to consider the negative side of the ledger as well. Unsurprisingly there: geopolitical forces, rising debt levels, social polarisation in certain countries, domestic political frictions in certain countries and of course, climate change. All of these factors could weigh on growth going forward and derail our progress.

So a lot to talk about. To help us unpack these complexities. We've got an absolutely star panel to do all of that. So let me go, I guess, counter-clockwise and introduce our panellists for this discussion.

Mohamad Al-Ississ is the Minister of Finance of the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan. Minister, welcome.

Mohamad Al-Ississ, Minister of Finance, Ministry of Finance of Jordan: Thank you. Sir.

Michael Wang, Anchor, Global Business and BizTalk, China Global Television Network (CGTN): Andre Hoffman is the chairman of Massellaz and vice chair of Roche. Andre, welcome.

Andre Hoffmann, Chairman, Massellaz: Thank you.

Michael Wang, Anchor, Global Business and BizTalk, China Global Television Network (CGTN): Busi Mabuza is the chair of the International Development Corporation of South Africa. And Dr Peng Sen is the president of the China Society of Economic Reform. Dr Peng will be speaking in Mandarin, so, for those who need simultaneous interpretation, please put on the device. English is channel two.

And just a reminder, if you are following the session or would like to share the session on social media, feel free to do so with the hashtag #AMC24.

Yeah, so let's get the conversation started. First question I want to ask each panellist, because I think this first question sets the stage for us and your unique perspectives will be shaped by the specific region you're based in, yeah.

So give us your overall economic outlook for the region and globally. Minister, let me start with you.

Mohamad Al-Ississ, Minister of Finance, Ministry of Finance of Jordan: Thank you, Michael, for having us. And it's an honour to be surrounded with such high-calibre panellists. For the Middle East region, it could be best summarized poetically by Dickens's Tale of Two Cities. It was the best of times, it was the worst of times. It was days of wisdom, it was days of foolishness. Twas the winter of despair and the spring of hope.

You can think of the Middle East as separated into two categories: oil exporters and importers. For oil exporters, it's been a good time. I think there's a lot of wisdom going on among oil exporting countries. I was delighted to hear my friend, the minister from Saudi, Minister of Planning, Faisal, mentioned that for the first time, the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia surpassed in non-oil economy contribution, the oil contribution, 51% non-oil GDP contribution, which is terrific. It gives them more resilience to commodity shocks. I think it gives them a lot of levers for growth. That's great.

Right next door to them, is a number of countries, including Jordan, which are oil importers that have been really reeling from a multitude of shocks, one after another that started with COVID, Russia, Ukraine, stagflation, higher interest for longer, the brutal war in Gaza that has sent the whole region into despair and frustration and the duality of human standards, I think when it comes to human rights and we're facing very challenging times.

At times like these, countries such as Jordan that have decided to invest in resilience, in building fiscal buffers and building macroeconomic prudence have weathered these shocks as good as it gets. In fact, last month we got upgraded for the first time in 21 years, I know, our sovereign rating by Moody's, which is remarkable given the ongoing regional onslaught. But for many other countries, the pain is real. Inflation has been hitting the middle class in oil-importing countries in the Middle East hard. Some countries have to revisit their currency situation and unemployment has been really rampant.

All in all, to sum up, Michael, the duality of experiences that our region is experiencing will have to come into a convergence. As our region is young – 70% of Jordan's population is below the age of 30 and out of all the deficits that the Middle East suffers from, nothing worries me more than the deficit of hope among youth. And we must must give them a potential for hope with a hopeful future. Otherwise, the impact and implications of that would not be limited to the oil importing countries in the Middle East but it will be widespread.

Michael Wang, Anchor, Global Business and BizTalk, China Global Television Network (CGTN): Thank you for that, Minister. Andre, over to you. So perhaps a tale of two regions in the Middle East. What about Europe?

We see, for example, inflation is still quite sticky in some parts of Europe, obviously still affected by geopolitical factors as well.

What are you seeing?

Andre Hoffmann, Chairman, Massellaz: Well, rather than getting involved into sort of short-term thinking, short-term forecasting – I mean there's a plethora of forecasts around the place, some of them look very different than the others. If we're talking about poetry, we can say that, as Oscar Wilde said, you know, it's always difficult to make predictions, particularly about the future. And so I'm not going to sort of get into numbers but I would like to talk about the quality of what we are doing.

I mean, clearly... Let me start at the beginning. I was born in 1958. We were 3.2 billion people on the planet. We are now 8 billion, 60 years later, 60 plus, we have a bigger amount of prosperity than we had before. The 8 billion people on the planet today live better than 3.2 billion people did in 1960.

But the consequence of that has been the loss of biodiversity on a huge scale. I mean, according to the London Zoological Society, we have lost about 62% of the species of vertebrate, vertebrates only because we don't measure invertebrates. So what I'm trying to say is that the current prosperity model is not fit for purpose in the long term. And what we need to do is to address the qualitative dimension, not as much as a quantity dimension.

And so I know that the future from now on has to be into a much more integrated model, which will take into account the impact our growth is having on the social, the human, the natural capital and how can we interconnect them. So in that context, the countries, which are in the future, the regions in the future going to be able to run these three capitals in parallel will do better.

I take the example of Switzerland, we have no natural resources. We have no nothing else than very good universities and excellent infrastructure. We used to have a flourishing bank industry but that's a bit in the past at the moment. So how are we going to be able to take what we have in our hand to construct the future is really where the question lies.

And that's again, we spoke about the pandemic. You know, the pandemic has demonstrated how resilient the current system is because it seems to be too focussed onto one single metric. Milton Friedman, 19, Nobel Prize winner, 1976 – the business of business is business.

And now these externalities that Friedman developed are coming to – have to be re internalized. And that's a very worrying future for the old world. And so I think that the young world is going to tell us a bit more but it's when I say the young world, you, of course are much more ancient than we are but yeah, you know what I mean.

So I'm going to not answer your question because I'm not quite sure what's going to happen in the immediate future because of the many uncertainty factors we've just talked about. But I know for sure that the current status quo is not going to serve us for the next generation. So we need to do something about that.

Michael Wang, Anchor, Global Business and BizTalk, China Global Television Network (CGTN): And we will definitely touch upon how we can perhaps rethink growth in our conversation ahead.

Busi, you were speaking with Andre about the biodiversity of Africa as well. We're going to talk about that in a second also. But give us your outlook first from the vantage point of Africa.

Busi Mabuza, Chairperson, Industrial Development Corporation of South Africa: So I thought Andrew was going to say the young lady from the young world is going to tell us something interesting.

Andre Hoffmann, Chairman, Massellaz: That's what I said.

Michael Wang, Anchor, Global Business and BizTalk, China Global Television Network (CGTN): You're young at heart, that's what matters.

Busi Mabuza, Chairperson, Industrial Development Corporation of South Africa: Michael, so, the African continent, of course, is one of the spots of population growth that remains in the world. Population growing at an average of over 2.5% per annum when the rest of the world is below 1%. So it's a very important area of long term focus, I think, for all of us, because we need this continent to go up the growth curve for the world growth to be sustainable into the foreseeable future.

So if one looks at the McKinsey 2023 report that is titled, Reimagining Economic Growth in the African Continent, they segment the countries in the continent into four categories. The slow growers, which unfortunately South Africa, my beautiful country, falls into and hopefully will snap out of in the near future. The consistent rapid growers and there in you find countries such as Rwanda, of course, which has been able to ensure a diverse, diversified economic activity. I think Ethiopia is also in that category.

They have a category that they call the recent slowdowns. And unfortunately, in this category, some of the large African economies, such as Nigeria and Egypt. And then there are probably the countries that are too small to make an impact at this point in time for us to understand what is happening.

And, the combination of these factors indicates to us that there is potential in the African continent. I believe that a continent with the natural resources, such as the African continent, has, should be leveraging the opportunities that the renewable energy, the green energy opportunity, which is one of the positives, that you have pointed out, offers all of us both in terms of unlocking energy supply in the continent, which we need for economic production but also in terms of harnessing the critical minerals that the world now needs for the new, greener energy future.

And I would like to urge our partners in this regard that let's not take an extractive approach in partnering the continent in harnessing this opportunity but rather let's where it is possible, invest in the continent to ensure that more of the value is actually created in the African continent itself. This is one way of ensuring that this continent is, part of the growth path of this world, which we absolutely need with the youthful population that we have.

Michael Wang, Anchor, Global Business and BizTalk, China Global Television Network (CGTN): Africa, definitely a growth pole in the future. Population nearing 1.4 billion now. Like you mentioned, young and dynamic. How do we better unleash Africa's potential, I think is a big question for businesses everywhere around the world.

Dr Sen, let me come to you. China's growth outlook. First quarter GDP growth, of course, 5.3%. What are you seeing here in China?

Peng Sen, President, China Society of Economic Reform (CSER): Well it is indeed after five years for me to come to Dalian to attend the WEF Davos Summer. And the theme of the Forum is the new frontiers in global economic growth. I think the topic today is the closest topic to the theme. We are studying the economic growth momentum as well as the risks ahead just as Mike has mentioned at the moment, we can find potentially optimistic growth momentum.

And I think because June 11, the World Bank issued a global economic outlook report and for this report, outlook report, the global economic growth was increased from 2.4% at the beginning of the year to 2.6%. And this can avoid a decline in global growth for three consecutive years. You know, in 2022, it was 3.1 and in 23, it was 2.6 and for this year, if we can achieve 2.6% that means the recovery is being realized and the economy is also being stabilized.

However, relatively speaking, the global economy is still faced with grave challenges. On the one hand, there are risks and challenges, like the geopolitical ones and the fierce conflicts and also the Russia-Ukraine conflict and the conflict between Palestine and Israel. And even though in Switzerland, they have just been in a peace meeting but the meeting has not achieved the desired results.

It is elongated, the crisis between Palestine and Israel will impact further the situation of the Middle East, including the transportation path in Red Sea for energy and goods. From such lenses, there's not too many positive facts.

About the factor of climate change and natural disasters, these are the threatening forces for humanity's element. The key for Chinese economy development lies in the uniliateralism, trade protectionism trends. These are negative factors.

Some countries, these are keen to build little yards, high walls, decoupling and breaking up of change and the infraction 301, infraction conductors by US government on China, the tariff on the EV is now 100%, PV batteries increased to 50% and the EU last week released the news of such investigation into the Chinese made EVs and this will impact the supply chain and industry chain. If we have more time to delve into these matters I welcome.

China's economy increased by 5.2% last year. First quarter, this year, 5.3% increase. Consumption and investment especially asphalt in May also recorded positive progress. So, I think the economy of China is having some increase and that is essential to the world economy.

We are still the engine of the world's economic development, a contribution of more than 30% each year. China will continuously open up to keep up the momentum to contribute to economic development of the world economy.

Michael Wang, Anchor, Global Business and BizTalk, China Global Television Network (CGTN): Really interesting because my first question was talking about near-term outlook but I think all of our panellists spoke more about the medium-term and the long-term mindset, which I think is a good thing to discuss if we want to find collective solutions to all these challenges.

I showed everyone the set of risks that the forum considers as potentially impacting growth going forward.

Minister Al-Ississ, I want to get your thoughts in terms of what do you think are the biggest risks that will challenge growth in, I guess, the five or maybe 10 years ahead. I know it's very difficult to predict geopolitics, for example, Dr Peng was touching on perhaps other risks that we haven't thought about.

What do you think?

Mohamad Al-Ississ, Minister of Finance, Ministry of Finance of Jordan: It's a very complex economic landscape we're living in now. The world has recovered from a number of subsequent shocks that created supply and demand, simultaneous shocks.

COVID was a supply and demand shock. Simultaneously, Russia-Ukraine created supply shock in Europe. The reverberations of what's happening in the Middle East region with, as the doctor said, the disruption of maritime shipping routes in the Red Sea is affecting the whole global economy. All of the above is coming layered on each other.

Some areas of the world will see earlier recovery, such as the US, than other countries, as they start adjusting their monetary policy, not in sync with other countries. This will complicate the situation globally. So you have multiple waves hitting different parts of the world at different times with different magnitudes. This is the status quo.

So assuming no other shocks, the situation is complex. But as as the survey you showed, I think spot on, shows, we're at a time of inflection points, technological inflection point with AI is real, is gonna replace a good number of jobs. That's gonna then further accumulate social tension within states as more and more people will be left out of their jobs because they're being replaced by AI. But on the other hand, the AI is creating real opportunities in different industries, healthcare and others.

So, reskilling and re-equipping the human capital becomes a top priority to adopt with change. But of course, that redistribution will take time and will have socio and political and economic impacts within countries, which will enhance that tension.

The protectionist situation we're seeing globally, the doctor mentioned EVs. We're seeing different protectionism measures taking place globally as countries are adjusting to the mix of new technologies coming to rise with new powers. That is going to create a lot of tension within countries. The world is experiencing the highest number of elections this year, unprecedented in the modern history to see this number of elections. And the current situation and the current concerns and fears these elections will then exacerbate this protectionist approach. So it's a very complex period.

There are, of course, positives. Technology is a big positive. Young continents such as Africa and the Middle East is a big positive. But reality is the era of cheap money, I think, is behind us. At least for the middle run. We're not going to be seeing a return to, the cheap money that we saw pre-COVID in the medium term. So it's going to be a very tough period.

As a minister of finance, I am aware of all of the above. And therefore, my focus remains everyday: build fiscal buffers. Maintain resilience at any cost, protect the middle class. And growth has to come from real structural growth that's technologically driven, not from chasing, low-hanging fruit that we had before COVID through thereof cheap money and expansionary policies because these are not coming back anytime soon.

So I think, in a nutshell, I think, as Warren Buffett said, it's when the sea water recedes that we see who's been swimming naked and who's been wearing a bathing suit. And we're seeing that. Some countries are suffering dearly. Some countries are building on the resilience they invested in to enhance their growth.

Michael Wang, Anchor, Global Business and BizTalk, China Global Television Network (CGTN): And perhaps we can come back and you can expand for our audience. How do you view fiscal policy and how can we build those buffers for resiliency down the road?

Andre, same question to you. The biggest risks you see impacting growth going forward. You mentioned the environment. Is there anything else that's on your radar?

Andre Hoffmann, Chairman, Massellaz: Well, the planetary limits strike me as being the most important thing. In our health industry, we have to deal with new pathologies emerging more and more. I mean, we have, of course, the whole gambit of, infectious diseases, you know, the number of vectors that survive in our geographies are increasing. We have more and dengue has arrived in Germany and in France.

We have new breeds of fungus developing in ... crops. This year, it is forecasted that the grain crop in Central Europe is going to be 40% down because of excessive water. I mean, we are getting into a clear sign that we are getting that we are hurting the world of development as we know it, at least in our economies.

So what can we do about it? We need, of course, to, as the Minister, just say, to increase the resilience of our systems. And the COVID pandemic has demonstrated clearly that we are not resilient. And so we need to make sure that we increase the breadth of what you do, rather than focusing too much on a couple of targets.

So just focusing on growth, which has been the paradigm until now, is probably not going to be, you know, we don't we should not look at the quantitative growth, look at the qualitative growth. And I think that's in that context, the current obsession with businesses to shorten supply chains, to bring back a lot of economic activity within international boundaries is not helping us.

You know, multilateralism was the globalization as we used to call it, was the source of richness that brought us to prosperity. I referred to in my opening remarks and I think that if we do lose this too quickly, it's going to have serious consequences. So the answer to the question is, yes, I do see planetary limits as a problem but I also do see the fact that we don't face it united as a at least a significant forum.

Michael Wang, Anchor, Global Business and BizTalk, China Global Television Network (CGTN): So then from a policymaker perspective, from a business perspective, how do we rethink growth? Because behind that GDP number, we're talking about the aspirations of individuals. We're talking about families who want a better future for their children.

It's not just a number. What we can agree on going forward is that we want growth to be more inclusive, more resilient, like you said, more innovative, more balanced. So, in terms of that shift in mindset, what do we need in terms of rethinking growth, less emphasis on that GDP number. What can businesses and policymakers do?

Andre Hoffmann, Chairman, Massellaz: So if you want to go from prosperity to sustainable, inclusive prosperity, we're going to have to measure success in a different way. And, you know, to measure success in a different way, we need to be able to measure our surroundings in a different way.

I had the opportunity to say that earlier on today, for me, quite clearly, the accountants are going to save the planet. We need to make – absolutely; I know it makes people smile – you know, we have to be able to quantify the impact we are having on the social, on the human and the natural capital and understand the interactions, as we said before.

But for me, what's important is this notion that we need to identify a metric that will be accepted by all and concentrating only on one metric, as we do now – the financial flows – is not going to be enough.

If we can school up a new school of accounting, which gives us the real impact reporting, an integrated consequence of our dealings with the planet, I think we are more likely to create a strong growth, which is going to be – when I say strong, I mean a robust growth, a growth that's not going to be challenged. So, for me, the next step has to be increasing the breadth of what you do and not just focusing on now the things that will increase resilience and it will give us a better quality of results.

And in particular, you try to mention the aspirations of people. If you live in a house to make people more happy, which is really the base of our system. If we don't have, you know, why do we, try to establish prosperity is to make sure that people can have security and future realization. And that's what we need to focus on.

Michael Wang, Anchor, Global Business and BizTalk, China Global Television Network (CGTN): Do we need a happiness index? How do we measure happiness?

Andre Hoffmann, Chairman, Massellaz: The happiness index, as long as we agree how we define happiness? Yes. I mean, if the happiness is just the new I don't know the status of the new Louis Vuitton bag or something like this, then that. I'm sorry, I didn't mean to make advertising here.

You know, if we only focus on this, then we're not going to get that. It's not materiality. Happiness is about being self-realized. It's about being able to meet your aspirations. And that's not just about the financial means. Of course. You know, the Maslow pyramid. You need enough to have a roof over your head to educate your children, to be heated, to be fed. I mean, all these things. But once you get there, the next step is probably a bit excessive.

Michael Wang, Anchor, Global Business and BizTalk, China Global Television Network (CGTN): Dr Peng, I want to get your thoughts on this because here in China, the country has been very consistent in talking about high quality growth. It's not just growth, it's not just the GDP number.

Talk to us about how China might be rethinking growth.

Peng Sen, President, China Society of Economic Reform (CSER): This year marks the 75th anniversary of the People's Republic's founding, meanwhile we will complete the 14th five-year plan and turn to the 15th five-year plan. So, when we analyse the current economic landscape we shall confirm the future economic development and social development strategies.

High-quality development and the development of the new quality development forces have been the new task because these are the key to cope with the new challenges and seize the new opportunities as well, such as AI, such as 5G, other new technologies through breakthroughs and new technologies reform to transform our industries and to allocate productive factors in an innovative way to create more quality productive forces.

So, to achieve modernization of China these are the driving forces. So, reform has been consistency for the past 40, 50 years. It is the greatest exploration of human history. It has solved the basic needs of 1.4 billion people and China has developed from a weak country to a developing country and has become the second-largest economy in the world.

Therefore, I believe that China, in the near future, will focus on market reforms, market-orientated reform measures to promote quality development and for the next five-year development plan for 2025-2030, there will be some strategy for the growth and the stability.

Michael Wang, Anchor, Global Business and BizTalk, China Global Television Network (CGTN): Contributor to global growth, one third. Coming up, we have the third plenum, which will have a very strong focus on reform and opening up as well.

What do you think are perhaps some of the most important reforms in the Chinese economy right now but also, what are perhaps some of the most underappreciated reforms that you feel the international community, the international business community and investors should know about?

Peng Sen, President, China Society of Economic Reform (CSER): Well, I think it is fair to say that for China's reform, in the next month, in the CPC plenary session here, will be decisions to make to address the existing problems but also to put forward targets. The problems need to be addressed, like the inadequate demand or ineffective demand and as for the targets, China will continue the socialist market economy and we need to set up market players, which are competitive and creative and of course, the market players include the state-owend economy.

You know, over the last 30 or 40 years, the private economy in China has grown now. We have the 120 million self-employed individuals and also, we have fairly large amount of large enterprises. So, how to mobilize them and play a more important role in the economy? This is a very important task.

And also we need to strengthen the institutional development that is to further streamline the barriers to investment. There have already been constraints or restrictions for investment.

And also in sectors like telecommunication and healthcare, my understanding is the barriers for investment will be passed out. At the same time, China will bring into further play the role of the Belt and Road initiative and also to implement the 21st century regional economic partnership agreement and the ASEAN countries as well. Japan, South Korea, Australia and New Zealand will form the largest free trade zone, free trade area.

If this kind of initiatives are brought into full play, there will be more vitality.

Michael Wang, Anchor, Global Business and BizTalk, China Global Television Network (CGTN): Also a potential growth point for businesses around the world amidst all the complexity that we are seeing.

I want to come to technology because the Summer Davos, the Annual Meeting of the New Champions, this is the Forum's premier platform for science, innovation and technology. We touched upon artificial intelligence and I can't wrap my head right now whether or not artificial intelligence is good or bad for growth.

So hopefully I'm going to get some wisdom from all of our panellists because, you know, reading through Mustafa Suleyman book, The Coming Wave, the co-founder of the AI lab, DeepMind, the author was talking about a supercluster when it comes to the innovation wave that we're going to see. basically, comparing it to a Cambrian explosion when it comes to this new wave of technology that we're going to be seeing.

Is it a double-edged sword? Is it an opportunity? Can it raise total factor productivity and boost growth or is it going to perhaps lower TFP?

Busi, let me start with you on net, we know AI can be a double-edged sword – on net – what are you feeling right now in terms of the impact AI might have on societies? And how concerned are you about potentially the AI divide among economies and regions as well?

Busi Mabuza, Chairperson, Industrial Development Corporation of South Africa: I'll start with what I am hoping technology will bring to the world, which is a better quality or and way of doing things.

I am, of course, anxious, because I come from a continent where there is a country where there's 50% youth unemployment. We're seeing and I must give accolades to the chief economist of the World Economic Forum for picking up the issue of social disparities and social discord within nations. And, we are seeing this play out in economies such as Kenya and other economies as well through the elections and the reaction, of course, of the political and policymakers is to then lift barriers and try to keep other people out, whereas the problem could just be how we address our own internal structural issues.

So I am hoping that technology will give opportunity, especially for the young African youth, to start creating their own jobs. It is absolutely magnificent to hear China talk about 120 million self-employed individuals. This is the kind of entrepreneurship that we need in the continent and that we see in other parts of the continent.

Nigeria is a fine example of thriving and Kenya, of course, thriving informal sector where people are self-employed and where they are innovating for their market and doing wonderful things. The technology that we are seeing is clearly already addressing issues that would have taken us very long to address.

I think the gaps that we see in the African continent, where there's no legacy systems, create an opportunity for us to leapfrog into the new future. And I think we were poised to do that. If I may use the opportunity to just refer to the fact that as the BRICs nations, we work – I work through the BRICs Business Council there – and we work through working groups. And one of the most important working groups is the Skills Development working group, where we share information, we share knowledge, we share technologies.

We invite young people to come and showcase the technologies that they are developing that are addressing local issues but may have global applications going forward. Those are opportunities that are opening up for the future.

Michael Wang, Anchor, Global Business and BizTalk, China Global Television Network (CGTN): Same question to all our panellists. Minister Al-Ississ, what about you? Net impact of AI on societies.

Mohamad Al-Ississ, Minister of Finance, Ministry of Finance of Jordan: Whether we like it or not, whether we think it's good or bad, AI is here and is here to stay and will change the way we live. That's reality. It will come with its goods. It will come with its bads.

I had a chance to chat with Sam Altman, the founder of ChatGPT, a couple of years ago, and I asked him, what is your biggest concern 50 years from now? He said, should I have turned on the button because the moment I clicked start, I lost control of it. It will take a life of its own. It's very hard to control and the reality is it's evolving in a very complex way.

And we need to come as humanity, whether we care about EVs or climate change or socio-political tension. We must come as humanity and put the right regulations so that AI does not, in a unilateral way, change our life to the worst. That is a potential and we must be very cognizant of that. There is a lot of different scenarios which are positive for our lives but we must protect from the negative.

And reality is, like climate change, this requires multinational coordination and we must come together, put our concerns aside because this is going to affect our small planet and it could affect it in ways that are irreversible. That's the reality. Some of the impacts it will have is it will – technology disrupts. And you know, I'm very happy to hear the hopeful view from Africa.

But reality is not everybody will be a successful entrepreneur and people will lose their jobs and that will create social tension. We are all alarmed about seeing what happened in Kenya yesterday, that socio-economic disruption will only accelerate, magnified by elections taking this year, magnified and accelerated by AI, magnified by protectionist policies, magnified by unemployment among the youth.

Reality is there is a lot of multiple equilibria. Some of them are negative, not all of them are positive. And we must invest in social protection. It is our duty to help those that are in need have their basics supplied and available and equipped.

But reality is like any technological inflection, it will create winners and that's great. And they tend to be few and they will win big and will create losers. And they tend to be many and they will then get polarized. I think the chief economist here picked it very well when they, he said or she said intrastate polarization is a real concern. AI, whether we like it or not, will change our lives. What are we doing as a humanity to lessen the negative impact of that now? I think very little.

Michael Wang, Anchor, Global Business and BizTalk, China Global Television Network (CGTN): Minister, you asked Sam Altman and he said he was concerned about turning on the button. Did you ask him, can we turn off the button? Is it possible?

Mohamad Al-Ississ, Minister of Finance, Ministry of Finance of Jordan: I don't think you can turn it off. I don't think you want to turn it off. I think AI is wonderful. I think AI can be used to improve our human experience in magnificent ways. But the reality is, it will take a life of its own and it will be very hard to control and it could be weaponized. And that's a real concern.

Michael Wang, Anchor, Global Business and BizTalk, China Global Television Network (CGTN): Our emerging markets, developing economies, are they prepared to weather this AI revolution?

Mohamad Al-Ississ, Minister of Finance, Ministry of Finance of Jordan: We all like to give a positive, optimistic overview; reality is, absolutely not. We weren't prepared to face COVID. We weren't prepared to face the previous multitude of political tension. We're still fighting the same wars that we started centuries ago. There is very little faith I have that we are ready to face the coming multitude.

I had dinner yesterday with a group of Jordanian entrepreneurs that are here in Dalian. Magnificent force for the positive. It is our job as governments, I think, to empower them, stay out of their way but at the same time to protect the middle class from the upcoming upheaval we will all face.

Michael Wang, Anchor, Global Business and BizTalk, China Global Television Network (CGTN): I wish Sam Altman was here. He was at the Annual Meeting in Davos, where he said at the Forum that we are, if I'm remembering correctly, reasonably closish to artificial general intelligence, which, depending on how you want to define it, is intelligence at the human level or surpassing the human level.

Andre, are you concerned? Are you glass half full, glass half empty on artificial intelligence? Where do you stand?

Andre Hoffmann, Chairman, Massellaz: Perhaps just an anecdote about Sam and his views about about what the... I met him in Davos last winter and we had this conversation and, you know, I come from the conservation movement, from nature movement.

And, one of the things we often talk about when we talk about the nuclear energy is the Three Mile Island incident. You know, the day when the factories suddenly, the supervisor lost control and we developed this idea of a Chinese syndrome. The machine was going to go straight to the globe and destroy China. It didn't happen. But since then, that rhetoric, that vocabulary, the Three Mile Island incident stayed as a sort of nightmare scenario.

So I asked him, what is your Three Mile Island scenario? And it was very similar to what you just said. You know, once it runs, there's very little we can do. The day the tool commissions its own research, then we would, of course, no longer be in control and we'd have to think that it's for the positive.

I happen to share your enthusiasm. I think a disruption is needed. The current status quo is not working and AI could be that disruption, especially if it's framed in the right way, especially if we do not – sorry to contradict you – if you do not let the market decide who is going to be the winner and the loser.

You know, the risk is too big to just leave it completely unchallenged. I went to business school and I was told, frankly, the market is always right. Whatever you do, don't worry. The market will solve for it. Well, it's a lie. It's not true.

We need regulators. We need regulators with strong teeth to be able to actually make a difference. Now, maybe the World Economic Forum is not the best place to talk about this. But the market needs framing. And I think that AI could help us to do that. And so let's develop that in the most possible way.

If I bring it back to my industry, the health care, you know, it helps us have briefings, it helps us for gathering more information about what diseases actually are. It helps us how to identify how we're going to solve these diseases but also help us, of course, in the production capacity.

How can we automate our processes so that we have less problems with the faulty batch from time to time? And I think that's a good sort of a summary of what artificial intelligence can bring to the production capacity of the planet.

We will get better quicker and we will also discover new ways of doing things. And that's a wonderful opportunity to change the status quo because as we said before, the status quo is not working.

You know, we do have a lot of symptoms that the system is under threat. I mean, climate change. I'm hearing angst among the youth. A rise of inequalities, which really has to be the biggest problem to address.

Michael Wang, Anchor, Global Business and BizTalk, China Global Television Network (CGTN): Dr Peng, I want to get your thoughts on artificial intelligence. How important is AI for China's growth trajectory? You mentioned in your earlier remarks the concept of new quality productive forces, which in essence is about advanced productivity.

So talk to us about how China is thinking about AI.

Peng Sen, President, China Society of Economic Reform (CSER): AI, in the past one year, we've seen great advancement of AI but though AI has gone through four stages with nearly 80 years of history.

AI's usage of technology and its impact on the world's development as well as on the productive factors – all these impacts were unimaginable previously. AI is reliant on the big data and LLM as well strong computing power. On these points, Chinese governments, R&D institutes and scientists are paying more attention.

Big data comes in massive volume in China because we have huge numbers of manufacturing entities. There are more than 600 cities in China, which generate large numbers of intelligent city management. Among the 1.4 billion population in China, 1 billion are using smartphones and create content and information. That's why we have the largest number of data in the world. the thing is we are not world top-notch in terms of computing power and AI.

The best AI companies in the large model LLM, they may have billions of parameters. In China, we are lacking behind sometimes only one-quarter of the parameters owned by us compared with them. So, next stage, we should improve our models as well as our computing power in the development of AI so as to contribute to the economy of China and the world.

Michael Wang, Anchor, Global Business and BizTalk, China Global Television Network (CGTN): Ten minutes left but I do want to leave some time for our audience to engage with our panellists. But I want to end on a more positive note in terms of how we can foster stronger regional and global cooperation to navigate all of the complexity, the risks that we see to foster stronger growth. So how about we get one or two sentences on that?

Minister, let me start with you.

Mohamad Al-Ississ, Minister of Finance, Ministry of Finance of Jordan: Listen, the concerns the different parts of the world have are real and they're translating them into policies. Some are protectionist; some are sheer out tension and aggression. And we need to appreciate that the concerns are real and we need to invest in confidence-building measures.

We need to tread carefully because with the rising amount of protectionism, conservatism, right-sided governments, I think there is a potential for things to really accelerate in a negative way. My plea to everybody is take these concerns real, invest in local knowledge in places you're working in. Many times, you know, one thing we know from the failure of the Washington consensus a few decades ago is that one size does not fit all and local knowledge really matters.

And we must really invest in a better understanding of the hopes, aspirations and real fears of different parts of the world and not jump in with a lot of financial powerhouses that can really bring a lot of short-term good but could really distract in the long term by exacerbating the concerns and fear.

Michael Wang, Anchor, Global Business and BizTalk, China Global Television Network (CGTN): Andre.

Andre Hoffmann, Chairman, Massellaz: Well, I strongly echo what I just heard. One size does not fit all. And if you really want to grow up in this new spurt of growth, we need to make sure that we unite behind the common goal. And that common goal has to be to create prosperity that we can share. And this is not a question of revolutionary sort of change of social system. It's a question of making sure that if you want to promote stability, you need to make sure that frustrations are eliminated.

And the hope that we've been trying to restore in the world in January and we're trying to since then, the hope that we need to create a certain stability in the system needs to be nurtured. At the moment, I see around me people talking all the time about it's going to be worse tomorrow. Well, no, it's going to be better if you want it to be better.

If we unite behind that particular goal, we want to create the wealth that you can share. On our company again, we have redefined our purpose as doing today what the patient needs next. And I would suggest that this can – this message again can go to the rest of the planet. We need to do today what will make the planet, prosperous next year... in the next generation.

Busi Mabuza, Chairperson, Industrial Development Corporation of South Africa: Absolutely the same views. Multilateralism. We need to respect each other's autonomy and collaborate for the long-term future. And secondly, taking a long-term view, short-termism is very, very costly. And it is very important that we all commit to leaving this world much better than we found it.

Michael Wang, Anchor, Global Business and BizTalk, China Global Television Network (CGTN): Dr Peng, your final thoughts.

Peng Sen, President, China Society of Economic Reform (CSER): It's fair to say, the status quo of the world sees conflicting view from different axes and some say globalization has created a lot of ups and downs. Some say, globalization hasn't died, still developing.

I believe the past growth was benefitted from the progressing from globalization, from the trade rules in the harmonious development for coordination. These were essential for the past growth. However, now we're faced with accelerating conflicts over geographic situation and ubiquity of political impacts around the world over the development of economy, which has created prices in confidence. The instability of the industry chain and supply chain.

So, I believe the key lies in neutral trust; we should respect each other, nation, culture and histories and the path they have chosen on their own.

There's a famous person in China who once said, everyone has their own view on beauty and prosperity and good; we should respect their views and diversity so we allow others to march on the ways they selected. So.

Michael Wang, Anchor, Global Business and BizTalk, China Global Television Network (CGTN): I want to open it up to audience questions right now. So if anyone has a question and let's wait for the mic to get to you. And if you could introduce yourself and then ask a brief question and say who you want to address the question to.

Audience member 1: Thank you very much. My name is [Undientified name] from Global Shapers Community Beijing Hub two. I want to address this question to all the panellists.

So, for aspiring young entrepreneurs in the future, especially in the age of AI, what kind of areas or industries do you think present some of the most promising business opportunities in the future?

Andre Hoffmann, Chairman, Massellaz: Can I?

Michael Wang, Anchor, Global Business and BizTalk, China Global Television Network (CGTN): Go for it.

Andre Hoffmann, Chairman, Massellaz: Pharmaceuticals, absolutely.

Michael Wang, Anchor, Global Business and BizTalk, China Global Television Network (CGTN): Who would have guessed.

Andre Hoffmann, Chairman, Massellaz: What I mean is improvement to the healthcare system. I mean, pharmaceutical companies, you know, just innovating on one or two molecules is not going to cut it. What we need is to address the unmet medical need and that's a system issue.

It's not just an individual issue, but you know, the convergence of all the technology we talked about: AI, micro-electronic, drones, whatever. All these together can help us to better develop the healthcare systems on the planet. And that I think if I were starting today, I would go there.

Busi Mabuza, Chairperson, Industrial Development Corporation of South Africa: To say if you can replace government.

Michael Wang, Anchor, Global Business and BizTalk, China Global Television Network (CGTN): Interesting.

Andre Hoffmann, Chairman, Massellaz: Even better.

Michael Wang, Anchor, Global Business and BizTalk, China Global Television Network (CGTN): Minister, would you like to respond to Busi.

Mohamad Al-Ississ, Minister of Finance, Ministry of Finance of Jordan: I'll be unemployed. No. In all seriousness, I think AI will really accelerate in areas where you can take big data, understand trends very quickly and build quick predictions.

Healthcare is an obvious one but I think it's unlimited from traffic control to gaming to what have you, I think if I were you, I would invest in a better understanding of data analytics because it can take you to different places across different industries. Look at cross-cutting areas on skills because these are the ones that will be most positively impacted by AI.

Michael Wang, Anchor, Global Business and BizTalk, China Global Television Network (CGTN): Dr Peng, would you like to address this global shaper?

Peng Sen, President, China Society of Economic Reform (CSER): Manufacturing industry in China, in general, is pretty unique in the world landscape; it is complete in its system. However, against the spectre of digital revolution and the development of AI as the prerequisite, how to have full progress that is the key.

However, I disagree that we should invest everything in the most cutting-edge and advanced technologies. We should look at different localities, situation to select those that has market demand and create benefits for the local people and we can discuss offline on this. Thank you.

Michael Wang, Anchor, Global Business and BizTalk, China Global Television Network (CGTN): The gentleman over here..

Audience member 2: Thank you. I want to ask questions to minister. So you know that there are a lot of Chinese companies that go overseas searching for the business opportunities. Middle East is the hottest destination but most of the Chinese companies just know about the UAE and Saudi Arabia. So, you're from Jordan. So if you can give us some kind of landscape about Jordan's strategy, a development plan in the coming future years and also recommendation to the Chinese companies, maybe you can do some business or investment in Jordan. Thank you.

Mohamad Al-Ississ, Minister of Finance, Ministry of Finance of Jordan: Thank you sir. Like Switzerland, Jordan does not have natural resources, so we had no choice but to heavily invest in our human capital. So, you can find solid human capital. You can find macro stability and resilience and prudence. We are an oasis of stability among a burning Middle East.

So, you can base yourself in Jordan and serve a market that is not only the Middle East but we have free trade agreements with the EU, with the US, with our world. We have young entrepreneurs. One of them is sitting right there, one of our success stories there. And they do business globally. Some of the entrepreneurs I talk to are doing business with Chinese companies here.

The one advice I have is, as I said, the Middle East is very diverse. It's a big region and those that have oil resources are very different from those that don't. But what is missing in the formula is a deep local understanding.

I would advise Chinese companies that want to do business in the Middle East: invest in understanding the concerns, fears and aspirations of the specific country you're entering. Because really it is very diverse. We're very like China, we're very proud of our history and civilization. But like China, we have big aspirations coming from our youthful populations.

I think there is a lot of positives coming in but the reality is there is a lot of concern. There is a lot of fear going on because of these transitions and I am the first to admit my ignorance when I come to do business in China. I think it's very important for Chinese companies also to invest in a deep rooted understanding of the other because I think it matters. We are open for business.

There is a great opportunity to do business that serves not only the Middle East but the whole region. And you can find human capital at a lower turnover and lower cost than elsewhere. And we are happy. I'm sure the entrepreneurs that are here are happy to establish these bridges but we must build the bridges before we parachute in.

Michael Wang, Anchor, Global Business and BizTalk, China Global Television Network (CGTN): One more question. Do we have one more question? Yes.

Martin Frank, Invesco: It's Martin Frank from Invesco. I'd like to address this question to the whole panel of whoever wants to address it.

Really interesting discussion. And thinking it through, I was just, you know, this whole concept of longer term, we need to be thinking towards common goals to achieve, you know, quality, sustainable growth.

I hate saying this in a forum like this but it's just so hard to reconcile that, as the minister said, in a world where we're seeing increased mercantilism, we're seeing increased populism, it feels like shorter term, whilst we have this longer-term hope, shorter term, it almost feels that this element of sovereignty – it's every person for themself.

Andre Hoffmann, Chairman, Massellaz: So for me, the question you're addressing is absolutely fundamental. We need to change our value system. You know, the success is not a short-term material gain. I mean, can you imagine the complexity of teaching that of, sharing that with the population of the world?

We need to find different incentives to success. And, you know, we were talking about the happiness index before. It has a lot to do with how you define your own mental attitudes about the rest of the planet. So the usual excuse when you go to forums like this and I've been going to one or two of them, is to say, well, you know, the millennium will solve it – the next generation.

And so I think we really do need to do a serious introspection. The current system leads us to the precipice and we know that. Not a very hopeful answer, I'm sorry.

Mohamad Al-Ississ, Minister of Finance, Ministry of Finance of Jordan: I share your concern that I think you put it beautifully. Really. Reality is when people go to the ballots, they vote for the lowest common denominator, certainly because polarization takes you in that direction.

The lowest common denominator is highly divisive and highly polarized. And therefore, if we wait for that to emerge naturally, as you, Sir, said, I doubt it will happen fast enough for us to address these concerns. I think that's why I personally invest in coming to places like this because I think you need a meta-structure that things beyond the tomorrows.

Listen, when you're a politician, you're really under continuous attack from developments, from recent affairs, from recent challenges and you shift very easily into firefighting mode. And what we need is a meta-structure that thinks about, you know, the longer term, the thriving, the thing that nobody wants to talk about. But it's got to change and touch everybody's life.

And I don't think that will emerge naturally. We have to invest in it. We have to push it down. We probably are already too late in doing a lot of that and we shouldn't wait even longer.

Busi Mabuza, Chairperson, Industrial Development Corporation of South Africa: So beautifully put by the minister. And no way is the contrast more stark than in the African continent, where we, on the one hand, are talking about a continental free trade area. And yet on the other hand, we have countries such as mine where there's 30% to 50% unemployment.

If you're looking at the youth only and therefore, the knee jerk reaction is to try and be protectionist in order to protect the jobs. What's important about coming to these fora is to hear the like-minded inputs and keep reminding ourselves that the most important investment is the one that is for the long term.

Michael Wang, Anchor, Global Business and BizTalk, China Global Television Network (CGTN): OK, we are all out of time. Fantastic conversation. Thank you to all our panellists. We know, of course, growth is definitely a function of the complex risks that we face today but hopefully we will see more international cooperation that can help us navigate these risks a little bit better. So, hopefully we can also embrace the complexity with more confidence and verve to build a better future for all of us.

Also, if anyone is interested in that Chief Economist's Outlook report that I was talking about at the World Economic Forum, we've put up a QR code for everyone to scan, for everyone to take a deeper look as well.

So thank you all to our panellists. Thank you to our audience for joining us in the session. Everyone enjoy beautiful Dalian. Thank you all.

Mohamad Al-Ississ, Minister of Finance, Ministry of Finance of Jordan: Thank you Michael.