The region’s corporate travel community is being urged to stay informed, adaptable, and prepared in the face of rising risk unpredictability and frequency caused by civil unrest, geopolitics, cyber attacks, and extreme weather events in the coming year.
Speakers on GBTA’s webinar, The Year Ahead: 2026 Global Risk Outlook (APAC), held on February 25, advised corporate travel managers to arm themselves with risk intelligence to make the right and timely decisions, and to use traveller-tracking tools to work towards proactive instead of reactive actions.
GBTA APAC Risk Committee member Victor Lim, global travel leader, Ingka Group (IKEA), said: “Stop travel to certain countries (deemed at risk) early rather than having to extract travellers.”’
Based on what was experienced in 2025, he recommended cancelling, rerouting, or postponing travel.
Lim added that geopolitical spillover effects – including tit-for-tat delays in visa approvals, sudden changes in entry requirements, and the rising imposition of Electronic Travel Authorisations – could disrupt travel policies and negatively impact travellers.
On the issue of cyber security and how to incorporate AI into a company’s daily operations, committee member Mamatha Basavaraju, global procurement travel category manager, Konecranes & Demag, shared: “Miscommunication can spread during a crisis and information has to come from a trusted source.
“As the risk also extends to suppliers, negotiate on how cyber resilient they are, the importance of transparency, the safety of the traveller if there is an outage, and their business contingency plan. Equally important is data resilience,” she added.
Addressing the increased frequency and unpredictability of extreme weather events, Bala Selvam, regional security manager at International SOS, advised travellers to remain flexible. He added that those booking back-to-back trips should build in a buffer for rest, and thoroughly understand their travel insurance coverage.
Destination and location resilience must be considered to determine if infrastructure is robust and travellers can access the airport, review the travel itinerary, and move out of accommodation in low-lying areas, for example in Manila, which was impacted by back-to-back typhoons.
As for traveler health, wellness, and workforce resilience, speakers said corporates need to consider the lowest logical fare for air bookings, give employees time off for being away from their families, and work with HR to manage travel-related stress.
