Recession or lacklustre growth in the next decade?

We all know that forecasting is an uncertain business and that news headlines should be treated with considerable caution.
But it is difficult for a small business to plan ahead without paying at least some attention to both.
Over the last week or two a random selection of economic and business news has included, inevitably, China’s continued economic slowdown, warnings of a “global financial bubble” from Germany’s finance minister Wolfgang Schaeuble, and worries from the World Bank about the effects of interest rate rises with national and the global economies still so unsettled.
In the UK, manufacturing and engineering growth has continued to decline according to the ONS (Office for National Statistics).
At the same time the service sector continues to perform strongly and energy and raw materials costs have been coming down.
Yet we are told that the UK economy is one of the best performing.
Given these mixed messages a report from McKinsey & Company outlines four possible scenarios for economic performance in the next decade. There are two negatives. They are uneven and volatile but high global growth, or volatile and weak global growth. On the other side are rapid, globally distributed growth with productivity increases and, finally, low but more stable growth.
All depend on how countries manage both their own economies and co-operation to tackle international challenges.
Clearly SMEs, even those that operate solely in a domestic market, cannot remain completely immune to wider economic issues but given such an uncertain outlook, perhaps the best message is to remain cautious but “Keep calm and carry on”.