- Global Systems 2026
- Executive summary
Executive summary
The edition on a few pages: the abstract, the key messages, the headline finding and what each steward reads in it.
Contents
- ·Edition home
- ·Executive summary
- 1The world’s risk is entangled, not additive
- 2Key findings
- 3Systems and sectors at baseline
- 4Risks and capability
- 5Concurrent breadbasket shortfall and energy price shock
- 6Lenses and readings
- 7The 2027 agenda
- 8Systems in depth
- AMethodology
- BData appendix
- CReferences and record
- ·Complete edition, for print
S.1Abstract
The world enters 2027 more than 1.4 °C warmer than in the late nineteenth century. 2024 was the warmest year on record at 1.55 °C and 2025 the second or third warmest at 1.43 °C; the eleven years 2015–2025 are the eleven warmest observed1. Natural disasters caused US$224 billion in losses in 2025, of which US$108 billion was insured, the sixth successive year above US$100 billion insured, driven by floods, storms and wildfires rather than one peak event2. Energy-related emissions reached a record 37.8 Gt CO₂ in 20244; about 673 million people faced hunger7; monitored wildlife populations fell by 73% on average between 1970 and 20209. This Baseline Edition fixes the reference state for the global water, energy, food, health and biodiversity system, maps the couplings through which shocks travel between regions and sectors, and sets the questions the 2027 global edition will answer from national, regional and sector evidence. It ranks no country. It establishes where the evidence stands, what remains uncertain and what to watch.
S.2Key messages
Six readings that frame the global baseline, and the eight questions this edition answers, each with its status and source.
1.43 °C above 1850–1900 in 2025, after a record 1.55 °C in 2024; 2023–2025 averaged 1.48 °C.140
How warm is the world?Reported
Insured losses exceeded US$100 billion for the sixth year running; 2025 losses were driven by floods, storms and wildfires.2
Are disaster losses rising?Reported
Half of 2025 losses were uninsured; in Asia almost nine-tenths were.2
Who carries the losses?Reported
No: energy CO₂ set a record in 2024, although clean power supplied about 41% of electricity.46
Are emissions falling?Reported
673 million people faced hunger in 2024; concurrent breadbasket failure is a rising tail risk.723
Is the food system stable?Reported
Wildlife populations fell by 73% on average from 1970 to 2020; six of nine planetary boundaries are transgressed.920
How fast is nature changing?Reported
Debt service: 3.4 billion people live where interest outweighs health or education spending.13
What constrains the response?Reported
A concurrent breadbasket shortfall coinciding with an energy and fertiliser price shock. SCN-GLB-BBF-01
What will 2027 test first?Expert input
S.3Headline finding
ReportedEQL 4NRF-GLOBAL-SYSTEMS-2026-BASELINE-FIN-003
Insurers covered about 48% of the US$224 billion in natural-disaster losses in 2025, about 70% in North America, about half in Europe, about 12% in Asia and under a fifth in Africa.
| Item | Bar, scaled to the largest value | Value |
|---|---|---|
| Insured | 108 | |
| Uninsured | 116 |
Source: Munich Re NatCatSERVICE 20252; the uninsured share is the difference between overall and insured losses.
The protection gap is widest where exposure is growing fastest and fiscal space is thinnest. Uninsured losses become household debt, delayed reconstruction and pressure on public budgets, which feed back into vulnerability before the next event21318.
S.4At a glance
S.5What each steward reads in it
GCRI · KEY T
Technical Truth
The evidence supports an entangled reading of global risk.
GRF · KEY M
Public Meaning
For most people global risk arrives as a price rise, a heat wave or a flood, and its burden depends on where they live.
GRA · KEY F
Capital Meaning
Readiness implications only. About half of disaster losses are uninsured, debt service crowds out adaptation, and climate disclosure standards are spreading.
NEXUS
Synthesis
The global system is well observed and thinly protected.
S.6What this edition is, and is not
What this edition is
A baseline: the state of the world’s water, energy, food, health and biodiversity systems in 2026, the forcing that drives them, the couplings that connect them and the capabilities that hold them. It synthesises published global evidence; it does not average countries into a score.
What it is not
Not a global risk ranking, a country league table, an official warning or an assessment of any government or agency. External rankings, where cited, keep their own method. No country’s national ownership of its own edition is affected.
What comes next
National, regional and sector editions feed the 2027 global annual edition through the federation. Each report states what changed against this baseline: new observations, source revisions, method changes, scenario updates and corrections.
Notes
Numbers are the edition’s reference numbers, so a note reads the same in every chapter. The full list, with every source and its licence, is in Annex C. Annex C, references
- 1WMO (ed.), State of the Global Climate 2025, WMO-No. 1391. World Meteorological Organization, Geneva, March 2026.back
- 2Munich Re (ed.), Natural disasters in 2025: NatCatSERVICE full-year figures. Munich Re, Munich, January 2026.back
- 4International Energy Agency (ed.), Global Energy Review 2025. IEA, Paris, 2025.back
- 7FAO, IFAD, UNICEF, WFP and WHO (eds.), The State of Food Security and Nutrition in the World 2025. FAO, Rome, 2025.back
- 9WWF (ed.), Living Planet Report 2024: A System in Peril. WWF, Gland, 2024.back
- 40WMO (ed.), “WMO confirms 2025 was one of warmest years on record.” Press release. WMO, Geneva, January 2026.back
- 6Ember (ed.), Global Electricity Review 2025. Ember, London, 2025.back
- 23F. Gaupp, J. Hall, S. Hochrainer-Stigler and S. Dadson, “Changing risks of simultaneous global breadbasket failure,” Nature Climate Change, vol. 10, pp. 54–57, 2020.back
- 20K. Richardson, W. Steffen, W. Lucht et al., “Earth beyond six of nine planetary boundaries,” Science Advances, vol. 9, eadh2458, 2023.back
- 13UNCTAD (ed.), A World of Debt 2025: It Is Time for Reform. UNCTAD, Geneva, 2025.back
- 18UNDRR (ed.), Global Assessment Report on Disaster Risk Reduction 2025: Resilience Pays. UNDRR, Geneva, 2025.back
- 11UN DESA Population Division (ed.), World Population Prospects 2024: Summary of Results. United Nations, New York, 2024.back
- 41WMO (ed.), State of the Global Climate 2024, WMO-No. 1368. WMO, Geneva, 2025.back
- 3UNEP (ed.), Emissions Gap Report 2024: No more hot air … please! UNEP, Nairobi, 2024.back
- 12UNHCR (ed.), Global Trends: Forced Displacement in 2024. UNHCR, Copenhagen, June 2025.back