Global Economic Futures Productivity in 2030 2025

Business trends Sector-specific trends have had a significant impact on overall productivity patterns since the global financial crisis, particularly in agriculture, trade, finance and manufacturing (see Figure 2.2). This has been particularly true for low-income economies, where agriculture and trade have each accounted for more than 1 percentage point of the overall deceleration of productivity growth. The finance and business services sector exerted the strongest drag on productivity growth among advanced economies, while for emerging-market and developing economies, it was manufacturing. At the level of individual businesses, the gap between frontier firms and laggards has nearly doubled in recent years, increasing from 6.3 percentage points to 11.8 percentage points between 2016 and 2023, according to Accenture estimates.8 A lag in technology diffusion is a key reason, with many industries and firms yet to deploy and harness new technologies. There is little consensus on the pace of productivity growth in the coming years, but it is likely to be shaped by trends in a number of key global developments – including technology, demographics, policy and geopolitics – and by the responses of policy-makers and business leaders. Technology The commercialization of disruptive emerging technologies has the potential to redefine the future of productivity. The World Bank estimates that a technology shock can raise productivity by 1.5% in advanced and 4.5% in emerging economies over a 10-year period.9 This is particularly relevant to developments in artificial intelligence (AI), the archetypal current example of a frontier technology shock, which has exploded into the public consciousness since the launch of numerous generative AI tools in 2022. Over time, AI is widely expected to deliver a systemic economic boost, although current estimates of the extent of this boost are subject to significant uncertainty.10 The long-term impact of AI on global productivity growth will depend heavily on how rapidly and effectively businesses across different sectors and regions can integrate it into their business models. As of 2024, the use of AI to enhance productivity remains patchy, according to the World Economic Forum’s latest annual survey of over 10,000 executives globally (see Figure 3). Respondents in high-income economies rate the adoption of AI to boost productivity nearly 40% higher than those in low-income economies, although it is notable that no countries perform very highly. Regionally, Northern America, Oceania and South-eastern Asia are seen as having the highest use of AI for productivity. At the country level, Norway, the USA and Finland are the main global leaders (see Figure 4.1).1.2 Key drivers of future productivity Perception of the business community about the adoption of AI among local businesses to enhance productivityFIGURE 3 High income Upper middle incomeLower middle income Low incomeNorthern America OceaniaEurope Eastern Asia Central AsiaSouthern Asia 2.0 3.0 4.0 5.0 6.0 Score 1-7 (high) Low local adoption High local adoptionSouth-eastern AsiaMiddle East and Northern AfricaLatin America and the Caribbean Sub-Saharan Africa By region By income group Source: World Economic Forum. Executive Opinion Survey 2024. Global Economic Futures: Productivity in 2030 8