DAVOS, Switzerland: People around the world place much more trust in their companies than their political leaders, according to a major survey that suggests a mood of uncertainty and pessimism on the eve of the World Economic Forum in Davos.
The annual Edelman Trust Barometer shows only one in five people believe the economic, political and social system is working for them, while nearly 60 percent think trade conflicts are hurting their companies and putting their jobs at risk.
The sense of gloom is strongest in developed markets led by Japan, where 84 percent of the general public — excluding the ‘informed public’ who are college-educated, earn above-average incomes and consume news regularly — do not believe they will be better off in five years’ time, followed by France at 79 percent, Germany at 74 percent and Britain at 72 percent. That is far above the average 49 percent of the 27 countries examined in the research.
Amid low confidence that politicians will fix the problems, these people are turning to companies, with 75 percent saying they trust “my employer,” compared to 48 percent for government and 47 percent for the media.
“CEOs now have to be visible, show personal commitment, absolutely step into the void, because we’ve got a leadership void in the world,” Richard Edelman, head of the communications marketing firm that commissioned the research, told Reuters.
Optimism was higher in the United States, where nearly half of the general public believed they would be better off in the next five years. The corresponding figure there was 62 percent for the better-educated, higher-earning “informed public.”
“The stock market was very good, the deregulation and lower taxes for the wealthy — it’s pretty good if you are an elite,” Edelman said of the US findings.
The survey, based on the opinions of over 33,000 people and conducted between Oct. 19 and Nov. 16, is published on the eve of the Davos gathering in the Swiss Alps, which this year brings together some 3,000 business and world leaders amid anxiety over the US-China trade war, Brexit and a slowdown in global growth.
“Violation of trust“
The pessimism in Japan, France, Germany and Britain reflects a variety of factors.
“I think Japan’s never really recovered from Fukushima, there was such a violation of trust when that happened,” said Edelman, referring to the authorities’ botched response to a massive nuclear accident in 2011.
Signs of slowing global demand and a sharp rise in the yen have clouded the outlook for Japan’s export-reliant economy, and the government plans tax hikes to pay for ballooning health care costs for its rapidly aging population.
“The problem for the three (European) countries.... is that given the reality of the potentially diminished economic future, there is deep anger in advance,” Edelman said.
In France, what started as a grassroots rebellion by low-paid workers to protest taxes on diesel fuel and a squeeze on household incomes has morphed into an assault on President Emmanuel Macron and his reforms, seen by the protesters as favoring the wealthy.
And in Britain, the Brexit crisis intensified last week after Prime Minister Theresa May’s two-year attempt to forge an amicable divorce from the European Union was crushed by parliament in the biggest defeat for a British leader in modern history.
The survey found that while only 49 percent of the wider population trusted institutions such as governments, this figure rose to 65 percent among high-income, college-educated and well-informed people — the biggest gap since the research began 19 years ago.
Despite widespread distrust of the media, uncertainty about the future has led to a sharp jump in people’s consumption and sharing of news and information, up 22 percentage points in a year to 72 percent.
But more than 70 percent said they worry about false information or fake news being used as a weapon.
In the United States, where President Donald Trump has repeatedly denounced the media as purveyors of fake news, trust in media varied widely depending on political affiliations.
Those who identified themselves as Republican voters showed only 33 percent trust in media, while 69 percent of Democrats did so.
Eve-of-Davos survey shows people place trust in companies over governments
Eve-of-Davos survey shows people place trust in companies over governments
- Only one in five people believe the economic, political and social system is working for them
- Nearly 60 percent think trade conflicts are hurting their companies and putting their jobs at risk
A month on, flood-struck Aceh still reels from worst disaster since 2004 tsunami
- Aceh accounts for almost half of death toll in Sumatra floods that struck in November
- Over 450,000 remain displaced as of Friday, as governor extended state of emergency
JAKARTA: Four weeks since floodwaters and torrents of mud swept across Aceh province, villages are still overwhelmed with debris while communities remain inundated, forced to rely on each other to speed up recovery efforts.
The deadly floods and landslides, triggered by extreme weather linked to Cyclone Senyar, hit the provinces of North Sumatra, West Sumatra and Aceh in late November.
Aceh, the westernmost province of Indonesia, was the worst-hit. Accounting for almost half of the 1,137 death toll, a month later more than 450,000 people are still unable to return to their homes, as many struggle to access clean water, food, electricity and medical supplies.
“We saw how people resorted to using polluted river water for their needs,” Ira Hadiati, Aceh coordinator for the Medical Emergency Rescue Committee, or MER-C, told Arab News on Friday.
Many evacuation shelters were also lacking toilets and washing facilities, while household waste was “piling up on people’s lawns,” she added.
In many regions, people’s basic needs “were still unmet,” said Annisa Zulkarnain, a volunteer with Aceh-based youth empowerment organization Svara.
“Residents end up helping each other and that’s still nowhere near enough, and even with volunteers there are still some limitations,” she told Arab News.
Volunteers and aid workers in Aceh have grown frustrated with the central government’s response, which many have criticized as slow and ineffective.
And Jakarta continues to ignore persistent calls to declare the Sumatra floods a national disaster, which would unlock emergency funds and help streamline relief efforts.
“It seems like there’s a gap between the people and the government, where the government is saying that funds and resources have been mobilized … but the fact on the ground shows that even to fix the bridges, it’s been ordinary people working together,” Zulkarnain said.
After spending the past two weeks visiting some of the worst-affected areas, she said that the government “really need to speed up” their recovery efforts.
Aceh Gov. Muzakir Manaf extended the province’s state of emergency for another two weeks starting Friday, while several district governments have declared themselves incapable of managing the disasters.
Entire villages were wiped out by the disastrous floods, which have also damaged more than 115,000 houses across Aceh, along with 141 health facilities, 49 bridges, and over 1,300 schools.
The widespread damage to roads and infrastructure continue to isolate many communities, with residents traveling for hours on foot or with motorbikes in search of basic supplies.
“Even today, some areas are still inundated by thick mud and there are remote locations still cut off because the bridges collapsed. For access, off-road vehicles are still required or we would use small wooden boats to cross rivers,” Al Fadhil, director of Geutanyoe Foundation, told Arab News.
“From our perspective, disaster management this time around is much worse compared to how it was when the 2004 tsunami happened.”
When the Indian Ocean earthquake and tsunami struck in 2004, Aceh was the hardest-hit of all, with the disasters killing almost 170,000 people in the province.
But MER-C’s Hadiati said that the impact of the November floods and landslides is “more extensive and far worse than the tsunami,” as 18 Acehnese cities and regencies have been affected — about twice more than in the 2004 disaster.
As Friday marks 21 years since the cataclysmic tsunami, Fadhil said the current disaster management was “disorganized,” and lacked leadership and coordination from the central government, factors that played a crucial role after 2004.
“The provincial and district governments in Aceh, they’ve now done all they could with what they have,” he said.
“But their efforts stand against the fact that there’s no entry of foreign aid, no outside support, and a central government insisting they are capable.”
