Natural hazards, cyber insecurity, IP theft top risks for businesses

Hyderabad We cannot really implement mitigation unless we have risk assessment at the micro level. A risk needs to be understood in all its complexity, said, Krishna S Vatsa, member, NDMA.

Addressing the webinar on 'New Age Risks', organised by Ficci, Vatsa urged that there is a need for a much robust database for the hazard events and invited FICCI to collaborate on this important aspect. "The database is extremely important for understanding the pattern of hazards and the magnitude of impact," he noted.

Vatsa appealed to the industry to not only focus on risk assessment but also look at the investments in area of risk recovery. "It is important to understand how risk transmits from one end to another end. If India has to become a 5 trillion-dollar economy, it cannot do so without having an effective risk management strategy," he emphasised.

"The nature of risks globally has changed enormously, and with their occurrences becoming more unexpected and their effects becoming more profound, risks need to be taken more seriously. In these changing times it is critical to understand emerging risks," Rohit Karnatak, MD, Pinkerton India said, and added that the FICCI- Pinkerton India Risk Survey (IRS) recognises the emerging risks for the developing economies like India, during the phase of new normal.

This IRS Report has been releasing annual risk ranking as perceived by corporates in India from last ten years. The survey report uses the Pinkerton Risk Wheel framework to understand and assess each risk individually and looks at risk from a holistic perspective for analyses.

"Timely communication is one of the most critical risk management strategies. Risks related to cyber space have increased many folds in past few years. We have been adopting and practicing a defensive strategy so far against cyber war, but we really need to work on the cyber mitigation and recovery strategy, not only for corporates but also for all the organisations across the country," Rahul Chaudhry, Mentor, FICCI Committee on Homeland Security, said,

Panel discussions on emerging risks from pandemic – Long term impact on business Continuity, and Covid-led disruptions – Opportunities for new business models were conducted as part of the webinar. The experts addressed various risks that emerged during Covid and their possible mitigation. The discussion also focussed on the opportunities created due to such disruption and how businesses could leverage the same.