On the road to a better future

The new year has started and we keep meeting people in a good mood, how can that be? After all, we have seldom had to hear as much bad news as in the past 12 months.

The corona virus and the fears associated with it had not yet said goodbye when the attack on Ukraine began, which was associated with unbelievable suffering and misery and which was no longer considered possible.

At the same time, the trade war between the US and China continued; high inflation caused interest rates to rise and share prices fell worldwide.
A recession is feared for 2023, the 1.5 degree target seems unattainable, but climate change unstoppable.

Of course, all of this keeps the prophets of doomsday coming. Aileen Getty, US billionaire and heiress to Jean Paul Getty’s oil empire, is financing a movement with the “last generation” whose bizarre actions may do more harm than good to the cause.

Now the belief in a BETTER future is not only the elementary driving force of my own existence but also the foundation of our social order.
If you take a similar view, then as level-headed spirits we could raise our voices right now and counter this, for example with facts:

If you look at the online publication “Our World in Data” from the University of Oxford,
will first see how much the living conditions have improved in recent decades. Poverty curves, life expectancy, child labor, literacy, access to clean water, victims of air pollution, natural disasters, armed conflicts, food calories, average income, all indicators looked significantly worse 50 years ago.

In view of the fact that the world’s population is still growing, at least for the time being, the challenges remain enormous, but stopping the global loss of the forest as a climate machine is certainly only one of the really big tasks ahead of us.

Many countries are already investing in the expansion of renewable energies, which are gradually becoming cheaper and more competitive. The vision of nuclear fusion as an inexhaustible and “clean” source of energy for mankind allows us to make steady progress in the development of this technology.

Economically, the currently high interest rates will prompt us to make more careful investments, the year 2023 is the year of solid companies that – resilient and adaptable – will increase the prosperity of everyone in the long term.

Wolfgang Schäuble, now 80 years old and still active in the federal government, recently impressed me with his firm belief in a better future. At the end of the TV interview, he was asked where he still got the strength for everything in his old age. Wise, seemingly unruffled and wide awake at the same time, he simply replied that he just always had the confidence.

Let’s just take it with us, exactly this confidence, and let’s start the new year together with it.

Sincerely yours

Ernst-M. Ehrenkönig/ CEO & Managing Partner