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Author: Future Agenda | https://www.futureagenda.org
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https://www.futureagenda.org/foresights/page/10/
New perspectives on the future are gained from multiple expert discussions around the world. Our ten year foresights offer rich, insightful views on some of the most important changes shifts – and challenges - that lie ahead.
The economic rise of Asia and the need for an alternative to the US dollar as the world’s reserve currency produces a parallel broad-basket Asian Currency Unit. Alongside individual national currencies and regional currencies such as the East Caribbean Dollar and the West African Franc, today there are essentially two key currencies that can be considered as global reserve currencies: the US dollar and the euro. These are the currencies in which key commodities such as oil, gold, steel and so on are priced; they are the primary currencies against which all others are compared; and they are the currencies…
Permalink: https://www.futureagenda.org/foresights/third-global-currency-2/
Widening differences in wealth between and within urban and rural communities extends the gap between rich and poor – but they still need each other. According to the UN, in recent years the gap between richer and poorer households has widened in most areas of the world despite strong economic growth that has created millions of jobs. This has applied not only in the gaps between some rich countries and some poor ones, but also within many nations: the rich–poor gap in the US has increased, just as it has in Brazil. This has been driven by a number of…
Permalink: https://www.futureagenda.org/foresights/richer-poorer-2/
Proven systems built on mobile connectivity and increasingly flexible means of exchange provide a tipping point in the shift towards the cashless society. The ability to replace cash with digital money transferred via mobile phone has been one of the ‘next big things’ for well over a decade now. Proponents have for years been predicting widespread use of mobile payments for a range of activities from transportation ticketing to buying a can of cola. They posited that this would all take off in the technology-savvy European markets, probably led by partnerships between banks, IT firms and mobile operators. What few…
Permalink: https://www.futureagenda.org/foresights/mobile-money-2/
The revitalisation of bartering, decreased trust in banks and increasing community focus broadens the adoption of alternative stores of value for trade. Allied to the changing role of money globally, several commentators see a rise in the wider adoption of what have been labelled as ‘local currencies’. Over the next decade, more people will probably prefer to use more regional, local or even personal currencies. Local currencies have been attracting a lot of attention and there is history in this space ranging from Local Exchange Trading Systems, frequently derided as ‘babysitting tokens’, to Time Banks and so on. However, the…
Permalink: https://www.futureagenda.org/foresights/local-currency-2/
Consumers are incentivised to use significantly less energy as escalating growth in carbon emissions forces utilities to change their business models. As highlighted previously, one of the four main certainties about the next ten years is that we will experience key resource constraints. One of the most significant issues here is clearly energy and, with our continued over-dependency on fossil fuels and the increasing global susceptibility to the impacts of climate change, momentum for change is building. However, we are not yet at a stage where either global agreements will take effect or where technological breakthroughs will provide new solutions;…
Permalink: https://www.futureagenda.org/foresights/less-energy-2/
Rising sustainability imperatives and increasing cost of ownership shift the balance from ownership to access and we prefer to rent than buy. The concept of ownership is core to many cultures, but not all. It has also been seen to apply in different ways to different things. Owning your own home rather than renting it has, for example, been higher on the agenda in the US and the UK than in, say, Germany where renting is more widely accepted and housing is seen less as an investment. That said, even in the US, the rich have traditionally had the luxury…
Permalink: https://www.futureagenda.org/foresights/lease-everything-2/
Pervasive smart meters and ubiquitous tracking services create platforms for the dynamic pricing of resources, access and travel to manage demand. Most of us today are used to the price of goods and services remaining largely stable. The cost of a loaf of bread, a pair of jeans or a bottle of water varies little if at all. Where there is variation because of competing suppliers and retailers changing their prices, this is largely marginal and occurs on a week-to-week or month-to-month basis. While the prices of key commodities, from sugar and coffee to oil and steel, do vary minute…
Permalink: https://www.futureagenda.org/foresights/dynamic-pricing/
As information is shared globally and insight is commoditised, the best returns go to those who can produce non-standard, differentiated knowledge. In his recent books The World is Flat and Hot, Flat and Crowded, Thomas Friedman, New York Times columnist and three-time Pulitzer Prize winner, did an excellent job of sharing how the flattened world of the past decade has been driven by quicker and easier knowledge sharing. Through his multiple examples from India and China, in particular, he highlighted how the alignment of increasing globalisation, high-speed internet connections and new business models all helped the likes of Infosys, Wipro…
Permalink: https://www.futureagenda.org/foresights/differentiated-knowledge-2/
The escalating economic and social cost of supporting the aged beyond natural lifecycles leads to wider acceptance of assisted suicide. Given the certainty of imbalanced population growth and the increasingly ageing population, some claim that there are people born today who, if they wish, could live for over 200 years. With the current record at 120 and a host of people already living past 115, there is little doubt that, with technology advancing as quickly as it is, physically adding another 80 years or so is looking possible. Whether or not mental capacity can be sustained for that long may…
Permalink: https://www.futureagenda.org/foresights/systemic-euthanasia/
More customised foods blur the line between pharmaceuticals and food as nutrigenomics allow individualized diets to fit genetic profiles. As awareness of advances in biotechnology is increasing, a growing area of interest is in the use of foods for medical purposes. There is a long-standing tradition in many cultures of using natural herbs and foods to treat ailments, in recent years, so-called ‘superfoods’ have started to receive increasing attention, particularly in the media. Interest is now rapidly expanding to foods with clinically enhanced properties. Probiotics, prebiotics, functional foods, clinical foods and nutraceuticals are all talked about and promoted as being…
Permalink: https://www.futureagenda.org/foresights/pharma-foods/
Medical tourism goes mainstream as low-cost cardiac surgery and broader healthcare provision join dentistry and cosmetic surgery to have global impact. Switzerland has long been a centre for medical holidays – a place where the rich have gone for relaxation and treatment. Over the past few decades, it also became a centre for more surgical vacations, often focused on providing cosmetic enhancement for its customers. In a similar vein, both South Africa and Brazil are also well known as places to go to get good quality cosmetic surgery. London, LA and Miami are also renowned as centres of cosmetic excellence.…
Permalink: https://www.futureagenda.org/foresights/mass-medical-tourism/
Stopping mental degradation from Alzheimer’s makes quality ageing more possible by improving cognition and slowing the rate of decline. In our discussions, one of the big bets for the future in the health arena that many are focused on is being able to halt the rise of Alzheimer’s disease. This disease is a physical condition affecting the brain and is the most common cause of dementia. Today, worldwide, 35 million people have Alzheimer’s and, as the ageing demographic shift has greater impact, this is projected to rise to 115 million by 2050. There is currently no cure for Alzheimer’s disease.…
Permalink: https://www.futureagenda.org/foresights/halting-alzheimers/
