The 'We'll Live to 100 – How Can We Afford It?' report looked at the challenges the world faced when looking to provide its ageing societies with a financially secure retirement.

Jon Hall, managing director of Masthaven (pictured above), felt the forum had brought the world to a crossroad, with policymakers, global leaders, the industry and savers themselves now needing to engage in a four-way solution.

“When it comes to helping people save well, I think we're way beyond the 'cost of a cappuccino stage' now.

“It's no longer viable for [the] industry to put the onus on consumers to 'save more' or 'spend carefully'.

“Given the forum's eye-watering short-fall calculations and undisputable human life expectancy projections, it's now obvious that closing the savings gap must be a shared mission.”

Jon was happy to see the UK's auto-enrolment scheme highlighted as global progress, but still felt there was a mountain to climb to increase individual savings levels, a key source of income in retirement.

“…All the data is telling us we need to take positive action today to avoid a savings crisis in the future.

“Since we launched in 2016, Masthaven has offered some of the best savings rates in the UK market and won awards for creating innovative savings products.

“But our efforts alone are not enough – we want more providers to challenge the status quo: zombie savings products causing savings inertia.”

Jon said the forum's action plan highlighted the need to make saving easier for everyone, and pointed to a combination of technology and education as part of this process.

“The UK is making great headway on the technology side, with both traditional and challenger banks devising fresh new banking platforms.

“But I feel we could do more on the education side.

“Part of this aspect has to be ensuring customers are confident it's worth the effort to save, and they know where to go for decent savings rates – giving people a fundamental reason to boost their individual savings pots is critical.”