With the Covid-19 pandemic having exposed various existing societal fault lines and laid bare a fundamental lack of social cohesion, fairness, inclusion and equality, the World Economic Forum (WEF) on June 3 announced the launch of its Great Reset initiative.

Drawing from the vision and vast expertise of the leaders engaged across the forum’s communities, the Great Reset initiative features a set of dimensions to build a new social contract that honours the dignity of every human being.

The initiative will seek to reimagine, rebuild, redesign, reinvigorate and rebalance the world, while addressing the world’s socioeconomic impact demands.

In this regard, the WEF said that those most affected, namely low-wage workers, the informal sector and people caught up in the humanitarian crisis, would be targeted.

Rebalancing investments, harnessing science and technology, and advancing the transition to net zero emissions are all elements of the Great Reset.

During the virtual announcement, UK royal Prince Charles implored that the earth be treated “as if she were a patient and [humans] are damaging her vital organs and suppressing her immune system”.

He called for the restoration of nature’s balance, and said that in order to achieve the goals set out by the Great Reset, “we must act for health and wellbeing, understand nature’s patterns and cycles, recognise the value of diversity, unity and the interdependence of all living things”.

Additionally, the Prince encouraged the world to consider the importance of innovation and adaption, and to invest in nature-based solutions to help stimulate a more circular bio-economy that “gives back to nature as much as we take from it”.

To this effect, the Prince proposed a five-part plan as part of the initiative to assist in rebuilding the world’s economic prosperity.

Firstly, he said, sustainable investment can be a fast, efficient and attractive way to reboot the global economy, which means that the principles of the initiative and any actions take under it should underline the reshaping of a new and better global economic system.

However, in order to create momentum for the Great Reset, the Prince said the imagination and will of humanity “will need to be captured” so that the global economic recovery can set the world on a new trajectory of sustainable employment, livelihoods and economic growth.

He further suggested that longstanding incentive structures that have adverse effects on the environments must be reorientated, and that systems and pathways will need to be redesigned to advance net zero emissions globally.

“This reset moment is an opportunity to accelerate and align our efforts to create truly global momentum. Countries, industries and businesses moving together can create efficiencies and economies of scale that will allow us to leapfrog our collective progress and accelerate our transition,” the Prince said.

Further, he called for the reinvigoration of science, technology and innovation, and said that investment to accelerate sustainable investment that will offer significant economic growth and employment must be rebalanced. This includes green energy, the regeneration of nature and landscapes, as well as the circular bio-economy, eco-tourism and green public infrastructure.

“It is therefore time to align sustainable solutions with funding in a way that can transform the marketplace, and this would be the most dramatic act of responsible leadership ever seen by the global private sector and would at once provide a catalytic incentive for the public sector to follow,” the Prince averred.

On behalf of the International Monetary Fund (IMF), MD Kristalina Georgieva noted that there would inevitably “need to be a very massive injection of fiscal stimulus to help countries deal with the [Covid-19] crisis and shift gears in order for growth to return [post-pandemic]”.

However, she emphasised that it was paramount that this growth lead to a “greener, smarter and fairer” world in the future, which she believes is possible provided the world concentrates on the key elements of a recovery, now.

In relation to the Great Reset initiative, the IMF recognises “tremendous opportunities” in terms of green growth, for which it said investments and incentives could be put in place to encourage private investments into low-carbon and climate resilient growth, ultimately leading to a job-rich recovery.

Georgieva is further eager to take advantage of the current low prices in an effort to “eliminate harmful subsidies and to bring in place carbon price as an incentive for the investments of the future”.

In referring to the digital economy, which has been said to be the “big winner” of the crisis, Georgieva noted that should it be allowed to “drive further division in the world” and for countries and communities alike to fall further behind, “then it is going to bring more pain than gain for the future”.

Therefore, she believes it to be critical to make investments that are going to shrink the digital divide and to consider how it can be used as a benefit for rapid growth in digital in order to build a platform across societies.

To create a fairer world, and to stop the pandemic deepening cases of inequality, Georgieva encouraged investing in people and in the social fabric of societies to increase access to opportunities, such as education for all, and to expand social programmes so that the most vulnerable were taken care of.

The IMF is stepping up in this regard, and Georgieva said that the fund now had $1-trillion available in lending capacity. This, she explained, was to encourage “tremendous engagement on the policy side to turn a page” and to pave the way to the Great Reset.

WEF founder and executive chairperson Klaus Schwab, meanwhile, warned that instead of focusing on the short-term outcomes, as in the past, “[the world] has to keep the long-term perspectives in mind for prosperity”.

As its contribution to the Great Reset, the WEF will collaborate on and develop a comprehensive system of environmental, social and corporate governance criteria for companies, which Schwab said should be a must for companies to report on, similar to how financial milestones are recorded.

In Switzerland, where the WEF is headquartered, the forum intends to create a number of task forces mandated to consider different issues in its local country of origin, and intends to confer with business leaders and the political community to address these issues.

Davos, where the WEF’s yearly meeting is held, will be made to be “very different and very open” through mobilising its 10 000 “global shapers” across 400 cities across the world to organise a twin summit and to “interact continuously to ensure that we do not fall back to old recipes, and to ensure forward-oriented solutions”.

The WEF, joined by Prince Charles, will hold a series of Great Reset dialogues for the remainder of the year.