Ninety-two percent of 1,100 chief executives in 50 countries were confident about their company's revenue growth in 2007, according to the annual survey by auditors PricewaterhouseCoopers.

The survey released hours before the opening of the World Economic Forum's annual meeting of global business leaders and politicians indicated that confidence levels were undiminished over the longer term.

Top-rated growth areas were rapidly emerging economies, like Brazil, Russia, India and China, and other developing countries.

Some 40 percent identified climate change as a potential obstacle to business growth, but the survey revealed a wide degree of divergence in attitudes between different parts of the world.

While 58 percent of chief executives in the Asia Pacific region pinpointed the threat of climate change, just 18 percent of their counterparts in the United States felt the same way.

Overall some 59 percent did not feel concerned by global warming's impact on their business.

PricewaterhouseCoopers' report on the survey said that systemic risks like climate change or a pandemic were generally lower down the list than financial or economic ones, partly because chief executives felt powerless.

"Our experience suggests... that it reflects a sense of futility among managers as they face a set of nearly insurmountable challenges," the report said.

However, Pricewaterhouse said the issue was beginning to bite, as a growing number of chief executives indicated that they were turning to public-private sector partnerships to mitigate climate change.

The top five threats to business growth in the survey were over-regulation (78 percent), lack of skills (72 percent), low cost competition (66 percent), energy prices (62 percent) and commodity prices.

Climate change was highlighted as a leading priority in another survey of business and political leaders by the Forum earlier this week.

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