WIN International, the world’s leading association in market research and polling, has published the Annual WIN World Survey – WWS 2022 – exploring the views and beliefs of 29,739 individuals among citizens from 36 countries across the globe.
The survey analyzes views and opinions related to the perception of climate change in 2022 and the importance of sustainable development worldwide.
Main concerns worldwide
There are many issues related to the future that people worry about. According to the survey, one of the main concerns for citizens worldwide is their personal or household economy (30%), followed by the economic situation of their countries (23%). On a regional overview, Middle East is the region with more individuals concerned about their country’s economic situation, while Europe registers the lowest percentage on this indicator (19%), being the personal finance the aspect that concern the most (31%).
Global warming is a serious threat for mankind
While the vast majority of people in every country agrees on considering global warming a serious threat for mankind, the share slightly decreased compared to previous waves. In 2022, 83% of citizens agree or somewhat agree with global warming being a serious threat for mankind, -3% vs. 2021 (86%) and -2% vs. 2020 (85%). Women believe global warming is a serious threat to mankind more so than men (86% vs. 81% respectively). Regarding the countries, United States (24%) and Poland (21%) have the highest percentage of population that does not consider global warming a serious threat for the humanity.
It is not too late to stop global warming
Individuals’ perception of whether something can still be done to stop global warming varies from very optimistic to very pessimistic. For 45% of the respondents, it is already too late to be able to do anything about climate change, a share that slightly increased compared to previous years, meaning the population is getting more pessimistic about it (2021: 43%; 2020: 40%).
Africa and Americas are the world regions where people believe to a greater extent that something can still be done to curtail climate change (60% and 54% respectively believe it is not too late), whereas citizens in Middle East region are the most pessimistic (only 41% believes it is not too late). Kenyans stand out as the most optimistic, with 87% of respondents considering that it is not too late to curtail climate change, in contrast with Philippians (23%), Indians (28%) and Italians (40%), who are the least optimistic.
Governments are not taking the necessary actions to take care of the environment
Additionally, 55% of the respondents feel that governments are not taking the necessary actions to take care of the environment (higher than 2021, which was 51%). It is noteworthy that 62% of the respondents from the APAC region consider that their government is taking the necessary measures to care for the environment, in contrast to the rest of the world. Kenya, Paraguay and Croatia stand out as the countries that consider that their governments are not doing much to take care of the environment.
Vilma Scarpino, WIN President, said:
This year for the first time a new section on main global concern was introduced: citizens’ top two concerns are their household economic situation and their country’s economic situation, concerns probably fostered by the pandemic and the financial instabilities. Among other concerns, we also find those who worry about the environment: the WIN World Survey has been tracking opinions on climate change since three years by now, and results keep being essential to understand citizens’ perception on the global situation. Citizens in every country are becoming more pessimistic on whether there is still time to fight climate change and, at the same time, they’re increasingly more acknowledging that their governments are not doing much to protect the environment. Governments and Institutions should leverage on the wide agreement that global warming is a threat to mankind and use this common ground to find global solutions.