Market and product

Oil price slump is one among the major factors that pose immense risk to supply chain resilience which is vital to robust business performance. “Threats to resilience—such as depressed oil prices, natural catastrophes and the spread of terrorism—are keeping financial executives around the world up at night,” according to 2016 FM Global Resilience Index .

FM Global Index ranks 130 countries and territories according to nine drivers that can affect the vulnerability of a business in those regions:

Declining oil prices are at the root of Norway's drop to second place in the third annual release of the Index. The oil producer was replaced by Switzerland, which was ranked 2 last year, FM Global said.

Oil-rich Kuwait (ranked 59 this year, down from 50 last year) experienced one of the biggest declines, since its gross domestic product (GDP) was hit hard by lower oil prices. Economic productivity suffered similarly in Colombia, which fell from 110 to 119.

Crude oil prices, however, cut both ways. Armenia (ranked 52) and Malawi (ranked 84) are two of the biggest risers in the Index this year, driven by an increased resilience to oil shock. Since their consumption of oil has fallen, the countries are less exposed to the dynamics of the oil market.