Highlights and key take-aways from the 2020 GSCI:

• Scandinavia keeps topping the GSCI: Sweden is leading the Sustainable Competitiveness Index, closely followed by Iceland, Denmark & Finland, while Norway is ranked 9
• The top 20 are dominated by Northern European countries, including the Baltic states
• Of the top twenty nations only one is not European – New Zealand on 11
• Germany ranks 15, the UK 17
• The World’s largest economy, the US, is ranked 32. The US ranks particularly low in resource efficiency, but also social capital – potentially undermining the global status of the US in the future
• Of the large emerging economies (BRICs), China is ranked 37, Brazil 49, Russia 51, and India 130.
• Some of the least developed nations have a considerable higher GSCI ranking than their GDP would suggest (e.g. Nepal, Guyana, Laos, Belize, …), namely thanks to high score in  the Natural Capital Index
• Asian nations (South Korea, Japan, Singapore, and China) lead the Intellectual Capital Index – the fundament of innovation. However, achieving sustained prosperity in these countries might be compromised by Natural Capital constraints and current low resource efficiency
• The Social Capital Index ranking is headed by Northern European (Scandinavian) countries, indicating that Social Cohesion is the result of economic growth combined with a country-wide social consensus
• Sovereign bond ratings do not take into account the underlying sustainability factors; they only describe symptoms, not causes. It is high time that credit ratings do take into account the basis of sustained wealth, because sovereign credit ratings do not fully reflect investor risks.

Download the The Global Sustainable Competitiveness Index 2020 (PDF, 55 pages)