Mega events present an opportunity to celebrate ideas, cultures and showcase human potential. Since the first Olympic Games in Athens, Greece, in 1896, the FIFA Football World Cup in Uruguay in 1930 and the World Fair (Expo) in Brussels, Belgium, in 1935, we have seen how mega events promote the economy, create jobs, foster collaboration and partnerships and revitalise urban infrastructure.

Each year, Control Risks’ decides the top 5 Risks for businesses in the coming year. While these are global in scope, here we discuss how they will drive developments in the business environment in the Middle East and North Africa in 2019.

The well-established crime of kidnapping-for-ransom saw notable developments in 2018. Alongside this dynamism, there was also a broad continuity in global trends which will allow businesses to plan for 2019 and mitigate this threat.

The global kidnapping environment saw several notable developments in 2018. In the most noteworthy global trend, Control Risks’ data showed average kidnap durations had declined to five days or fewer. This represents...

Control Risks has been publishing RiskMap, our annual forecast of political and security risk, for more than 25 years.