London | There’s a striking paradox about Davos, this week’s annual gathering of the world’s global political and financial elite: Australia will be taking centre stage, but for once there’ll barely be any Australians in town.

The Swiss-based World Economic Forum (WEF), hosting the A-list extravaganza in the Alpine skiing village for the 50th time, has put “stakeholder capitalism” and climate change at the top of the agenda – and right now, almost nobody talks about climate without mentioning Australia’s vicious bushfire season in the same breath.