Supply chains plan for coronavirus disruption | Supply Chain Dive | 29 Jan 2020

Companies that rely on manufacturing from facilities in Wuhan, China, are considering alternative suppliers as facilities in the region face potential production delays. The number of coronavirus cases has exceeded 4,500 and the region has implemented a quarantine​ limiting travel in and out of the industrial hub.

Tech Sector Fears Supply Delays as Effects of Virus Ripple Through China | Wall Street Journal | 31 Jan 2020

The world’s biggest tech companies are facing disruptions to their supply chains from prolonged factory closures and labor shortages in China, as the deadly coronavirus outbreak threatens the nation’s vast manufacturing network.

Now is the time to tackle your business resilience.

With the annual budgeting setting time just around the corner, this is a good time to start preparations to build a case to have budget allocated to increase your organisation’s resilience.

Leaders often say “Don’t waste a crisis” in the wake of a disaster. The month of January in Australia has been extraordinary by any measure – and the crises continues into February. Whether it’s floods, fires, hail, unbreathable air, dust storms, extreme heat, drought (and drinking water scarcity), extreme wind and now the emerging coronavirus – we’ve had them all in Australia. The impact of the fires on our flora and fauna will take months to just assess. The impact on our social infrastructure, homes and businesses will be huge.

With these issues being discussed every day in the media, executives must be considering the possibility that a similar crisis could impact the viability of the organisation they lead. Who in Tennis Australia could have anticipated that the Australian Open would have been impacted by smoke coming from bushfires 1,000KM away?

If your organisation currently does not have an annual budget for business resilience – now is the time to have one approved! Increasing your organisation’s business resilience must be treated as an on-going program. It is not a project! You may need to re-establish a business continuity and crisis management plan initially and as a consequence there will be a project to carry out this work. You will also need to budget for its improvement over time and its on-going maintenance. As a minimum, you should seek budget approval over three years. Five years is preferable! The Business Resilience Program budget request should contain allocation for the following activities:

• Allocation of an FTE (or part FTE) to be the person responsible for the Program.
• Establishment of a Program Policy and Program Steering Committee.
• Funds for projects to develop a Crisis Management Plan (CMP) and a Business Continuity Plan (BCP). If these already exist, estimate the effort involved in updating them – if required.
• Allowance for the provision of workplace recovery offices – if required.
• Budget for crisis communications software – if required.
• Allocation of a legal person to review your organisation’s contracts with critical third party suppliers (particularly cloud providers).
• Once the CMP and BCP are established, initiate an exercising schedule (at least annually) where key participants in the Program exercise their skills.
• Improvement of the Program over time.
• Annual review of your Business Impact Analysis (BIA) to ensure your Prioritised Activities have not changed since you last completed the BIA.

Please contact Continuity Matters if you need assistance in completing this work. We can also assist in the development of a business case to help justify the allocation of the funds. Your organisation could also consider using Continuity Matters to implement the Program “as a service”.

The April budget setting period is not far away – now is the time to start!

Dear Davos: Read Klaus Schwab's letter to all participants in full | WEF

Climate change threatens future of Australian Open and summer sports | The New Daily

Physical risk from climate change impacts summer sports events.

Climate crisis fills top five places of World Economic Forum’s risks report | The Guardian

The World Economic Forum’s annual risks report found that, for the first time in its 15-year history, the environment filled the top five places in the list of concerns likely to have a major impact over the next decade.

Finance counts the cost of the bushfire catastrophe | AFR

"Where the law requires the disclosure of climate risk, needless to say it should be done in a way that's useful and relevant to the market", he said. "Where climate risk is material, we're actively encouraging directors and advisers to provide voluntary disclosure to the market.”

See Where Australia’s Deadly Wildfires Are Burning | NY Times

Energy grid under threat as bushfires bear down on power lines | The Age

2019 was Australia's hottest and driest year on record | ABC

Australia's annual mean temperature was 1.52 degrees Celsius above the 1961-90 average of 21.8C — well above the previous hottest year (2013) at 1.33C.

The Muni Bond Market's Biggest Credit Risk: Climate Change | ThinkAdvisor

Most at risk are localities that are already economically challenged, located in low-tax states and threatened with extreme weather-related events.

NAB reveals how it secured APRA's cloud blessing | IT News

NAB has revealed for the first time how it secured the Australian Prudential Regulation Authority’s blessing to operate in the cloud at scale.

Rising Seas Will Erase More Cities by 2050, New Research Shows NY Times

“So this is far more than an environmental problem,” he said. “It’s a humanitarian, security and possibly military problem too.”

Insurance premiums high because of government misspend | The New Daily

he insurance industry has already declared Australia’s second bushfire ‘catastrophe’ of the season despite summer not yet arriving, renewing calls for more government mitigation work.

Thinking Ahead Institute reveals top fifteen extreme risks for investors | GARP

Non-financial threats loom larger, relative to economic or banking worries, according to the Thinking Ahead Institute.

Global temperature change ranks No. 1 on a list of 15 extreme risks compiled by the Thinking Ahead Institute (TAI). 

The institute, a not-for-profit outgrowth of Willis Towers Watson Investments' Thinking Ahead Group, which dates back to 2002, raised the climate issue two places higher than it was in a 2013 ranking of “potential events that are very unlikely to occur but could have a significant impact on economic growth and asset returns should they happen.”

Currently placing second is global trade collapse, up from fifth in 2013, followed by a new entry, cyber warfare. Tim Hodgson, head of the Thinking Ahead Group, pointed to a general trend of “financial risks falling down the rankings and non-financial extreme risks growing in significance. Global temperature change becomes the highest-ranked risk due to our assessment of higher likelihood coupled with significant impact – in the extreme this would mean mass extinction.” Continue reading on GARP website.