LONDON, May 17, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- In response to stark new warnings that the world will likely warm by more than 1.5° C over the next five years, Henley & Partners in partnership with Deep Knowledge Analytics today launched the Investment Migration Climate Resilience Index — a unique new analytical tool to assess your own country's climate resilience and explore investment migration program options that offer a pathway to residence rights or citizenship acquisition in more climate resilient locations in return for making a significant investment in the host country's economy.

Using over 900 different data points within 5 parameters, and considering key factors of vulnerability, readiness to leverage climate investments, and economic ability to adapt, the innovative new study has produced a Climate Resilience score for 180 countries and separated them into three resilience bands: higher resilience (scores of 60 or more out of 100), medium resilience (scores of 45 to 59.9), and lower resilience (scores of 44.9 or less). The sobering reality is that the vast majority — 142 countries — fall in the lower resilience band where citizens are more at risk from extreme environmental events such as forest fires, hurricanes, heat waves, floods, droughts, and storms. Infrastructure will be both weaker and more exposed, and the ability to prepare for and respond to the aftermath of extreme weather events will be lower.

The Investment Migration Climate Resilience Index uniquely combines World Bank GDP data (the average of normalized GDP and GDP per capita for each country) with the University of Notre Dame's latest Notre Dame Global Adaptation Initiative (ND-GAIN) Country Index, which summarizes countries' vulnerability to climate change and readiness to convert financial investments (climate finance) into climate adaptation measures. By adding GDP data to the mix, Henley & Partners' new Global Climate Resilience Ranking incorporates the important consideration of a country's economic ability to adapt to climate change and protect its citizens against the most adverse effects.

Unsurprisingly, the top five countries are all in the northern hemisphere. The US ranks 1^st, with a Climate Resilience score of 70.6, followed by Germany (70.3), the UK (69.4), Switzerland (68.4), and Canada (68.3) in 5^th place by a narrow margin. Even less surprisingly, Sub-Saharan countries occupy the bottom five positions with the world's least climate resilient country being Chad, in 136^th place, with a score of just 19.1 out of 100. 

CEO of Henley & Partners, Dr. Juerg Steffen, says climate change concerns are increasingly informing the long-term asset location strategies of international investors, business owners, and entrepreneurs. "Climate change is already impacting on all aspects of our lives so by investing in a more climate resilient country, in addition to residence rights or a supplementary citizenship, investors gain the right to relocate their families, their assets, and critical infrastructure to a more resilient place that will be able to better withstand future climate shocks."

Out of just fifteen countries globally that are classified as higher resilience, seven host investment migration programs, including the US EB-5 Immigrant Investor Program, the UK Tier 1 Innovator Visa, the Swiss Residence Program, which Henley & Partners designed for non-EU and non-EFTA nationals, Canada's Start-Up Visa Program, Australia's Business Innovation and Investment Program, the Luxembourg Residence by Investment Program and the Italy Residence by Investment Program.

There are eight investment migration options in medium resilience countries including the Singapore Global Investor Program, Ireland's Immigrant Investor Program, the Austria Citizenship by Investment provisions, the Spain Residence by Investment Program, the New Zealand Residence by Investment Program, the UAE's new residence visa options, the Portugal Golden Residence Permit Program and the  Turkey Citizenship by Investment Program.

Dominic Volek, Group Head of Private Clients at Henley & Partners, says no one should be planning for the long term without considering the climate change factor. "The countries and cities that are most resilient will attract global talent and investors in search of 'climate havens' that have prepared for what lies ahead. The time has come to actively build future-ready climate resilient portfolios if you want to lower your risk to the inevitable impact of climate disasters."

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