Trends Identified
Global Governance and Economic Disparity
The great 21st century paradox is that as the world grows together, it also grows apart. Improved global governance is advanced to meet the challenge of increasing economic disparity. But this, in turn, leads to a further paradox: the conditions that make improved global governance so crucial – divergent interests, conflicting incentives and differing norms and values – are also the ones that make its realisation so difficult, complex and messy.
2011
Just imagine - RICS strategic foresight 2030
Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors (RICS)
Nanomaterials
The group of materials currently attracting most attention are nano-titanium dioxide, nanozinc oxide, fullerenes, carbon allotropes such as nanotubes or graphene, and nanosilver. Those materials are marketed in clearly smaller quantities than the traditional nanomaterials, but the use of some of these materials is increasing fast. Other new nanomaterials and new uses are being developed rapidly. While some nanomaterials offer improvement in established uses e.g. in automotive or construction sector, many are used in innovative applications such as catalysts, electronics, solar panels, batteries and biomedical applications including diagnostics and tumour therapies. Some, due to their unique properties exclusively originating from nanoscale phenomena, can be used for specific applications which cannot be attained by conventional macroscale materials.
2015
Preparing the Commission for future opportunities - Foresight network fiches 2030
European Strategy and Policy Analysis System (ESPAS)
The future is electrifying
The growing electrification of energy; in 2016, spending by the world’s consumers on electricity approached parity with their spending on oil products.
2017
World energy outlook 2017 executive summary
International Energy Agency (IEA)
Lifestyle choices, lifestyle diseases
The growing threat today is non-communicable diseases (NDC). Most are caused by preventable factors, including poor diet, obesity and inactivity. NDCs like diabetes, cancer, heart disease, stroke, and chronic lung disease were responsible for 63 percent, or 36 million, of all global deaths in 2008. Described as the “invisible epidemic”,88 NCDs are now
the leading cause of death in the world.
2013
Now for the long term - The Report of the Oxford Martin Commission for Future Generations
Oxford Martin School
Get snappy
The growing use of image recognition for quicker and easier interactions.
2018
2018 trends
Mindshare
Demographic dynamics
The growth and aging of populations, migration, and urbanization are factors that will shape the course of societies and economies. As one of seven megatrends identified and analyzed in our Trend Compendium 2030, changing trends in demographics loom large. In this publication, we take a focused look at demographic dynamics, their impact on our world, and how they will affect the way we do business.
2017
Megatrends: a bigger picture for a better strategy
Roland Berger Strategy Consultants
Human Microbiome Therapeutics
The human body is perhaps more properly described as an ecosystem than as a single organism: microbial cells typically outnumber human cells by 10 to one. This human microbiome has been the subject of intensifying research in the past few years, with the Human Microbiome Project in 2012 reporting results generated from 80 collaborating scientific institutions. They found that more than 10,000 microbial species occupy the human ecosystem, comprising trillions of cells and making up 1%-3% of the body’s mass. Through advanced DNA sequencing, bioinformatics and culturing technologies, the diverse microbe species that cohabitate with the human body are being identified and characterized, with differences in their abundance correlated with disease and health. It is increasingly understood that this plethora of microbes plays an important role in our survival: bacteria in the gut, for example, allow humans to digest foods and absorb important nutrients that their bodies would otherwise not be able to access. On the other hand, pathogens that are ubiquitous in humans can sometimes turn virulent and cause sickness or even death. Attention is being focused on the gut microbiome and its role in diseases ranging from infections to obesity, diabetes and inflammatory bowel disease. It is increasingly understood that antibiotic treatments that destroy gut flora can result in complications such as Clostridium difficile infections, which can in rare cases lead to life-threatening complications. On the other hand, a new generation of therapeutics comprising a subset of microbes found in healthy gut are under clinical development with a view to improving medical treatments. Advances in human microbiome technologies clearly represent an unprecedented way to develop new treatments for serious diseases and to improve general healthcare outcomes in our species.
2014
Top 10 emerging technologies for 2014
World Economic Forum (WEF)
Getting old isn’t what it used to be: Responding to the challenges of an aging world
The human population is getting older. Fertility is falling, and the world’s population is graying dramatically. While aging has been evident in developed economies for some time—Japan and Russia have seen their populations decline over the past few years—the demographic deficit is now spreading to China and soon will reach Latin America. For the first time in human history, aging could mean that the planet’s population will plateau in most of the world.
2015
The four global forces breaking all the trends
McKinsey
Hyperloop
The Hyperloop is designed to be an alternative technology to air travel, creating super high – speed on -ground travel connections, powered by electricity, across major industrial or population centers. Here too, estimates are missing, but high capital lock – in and long construction phases suggest limited penetration by 2040, even under an optimistic scenario, although hyperloops may come to play a more prominent role in the long - term.
2018
The bigger picture- The impact of automation, AI, shared economy on oil demand
The 2° Investing Initiative
Global environmental change
The impact of human behaviour on the state of the planet is being increasingly understood and mapped. Data on oceans, ecosystems, the cryosphere and the atmosphere are now available to show what this is likely to mean if environmental change continues at its present rate.
2011
ICSU Foresight Analysis
International Council for Science (ICSU)