Trends Identified

Global banking seeks recovery through transformation
The global financial system remains in flux. The uncertain landscape poses both opportunities and risks for financial institutions, alternative asset managers and other enterprises that need funding to meet growth objectives.
2011
Tracking global trends - How six key developments are shaping the business world
EY
Global development: 'A vaccine will rid the world of Aids'
Within 25 years, the world will achieve many major successes in tackling the diseases of the poor. Certainly, we will be polio-free and probably will have been for more than a decade. The fight to eradicate polio represents one of the greatest achievements in global health to date. It has mobilised millions of volunteers, staged mass immunisation campaigns and helped to strengthen the health systems of low-income countries. Today, we have eliminated 99% of the polio in the world and eradication is well within reach.Vaccines that prevent diseases such as measles and rotavirus, currently available in rich countries, will also become affordable and readily available in developing countries. Since it was founded 10 years ago, the Gavi Alliance, a global partnership that funds expanded immunisation in poor countries, has helped prevent more than 5 million deaths. It is easy to imagine that in 25 years this work will have been expanded to save millions more lives by making life-saving vaccines available all over the world. I also expect to see major strides in new areas. A rapid point-of-care diagnostic test – coupled with a faster-acting treatment regimen – will so fundamentally change the way we treat tuberculosis that we can begin planning an elimination campaign.We will eradicate malaria, I believe, to the point where there are no human cases reported globally in 2035. We will also have effective means for preventing Aids infection, including a vaccine. With the encouraging results of the RV144 Aids vaccine trial in Thailand, we now know that an Aids vaccine is possible. We must build on these and promising results on other means of preventing HIV infection to help rid the world of the threat of Aids.
2011
20 predictions for the next 25 years
The Guardian
Global dominance of the top three economies
By 2030 the top three economies of the world will be the US, China and India. Such will be the growth of the two latter countries, in particular, that by 2050 they will each be richer than the next five (Indonesia, Germany, Japan, Brazil, and the UK) put together. This will represent a scale of wealth relative to the rest of the top ten that is unique in recorded history.
Given China’s and India’s economic might, they will take on a much bigger role in addressing global issues such as climate change, international security and global economic governance. In the medium term, this will require the world’s existing powers—notably the US—to let India, and especially China, play a greater role on the world stage and adapt international institutions to allow them to exert greater influence.
2015
Long-term macroeconomic forecasts Key trends to 2050
The Economist
Global economic growth has rebounded and is expected to remain stable but low
Global economic growth increased to 3.6 per cent in 2017, after hitting a six-year low of 3.2 per cent in 2016. The recovery was broad based, driven by expansions in developing, emerging and developed countries alike. Future growth is likely to stay below 4 per cent, as economic activity normalizes in most major economies without signi cant stimulus and fixed investment remains at a moderate level.
2018
World Employment and Social Outlook
International Labour Organization (ILO)
Global Economic Recession
The International Monetary Fund (IMF) considers there have been 5 global recessions in the last 30 years. Further global economic recessions will happen over the next 30 years, and governments are likely to respond to them with protectionist policies designed to shield their own economies and workforces. However, they are likely to temper the extent of such policies, to maintain the integrity of the international system for global trade and capital movements. In extremis, protectionist measures that cause the reversal of economic globalisation are possible.
2010
Global strategic trends - out to 2040
UK, Ministry of Defence
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)
Global flows of goods, information, and capital
Executives are generally optimistic that the relatively free flow of goods and capital—two core drivers of globalization—will survive the financial crisis and the economic downturn. However, few see much further progress occurring in the next five years, a finding that is consistent with the modest hopes for multilateral cooperation also seen in this survey.
2010
Five forces reshaping the global economy: McKinsey Global Survey results
McKinsey
Global Governance
The UN will continue to offer a framework for international discourse. It will continue to be the global service provider, offering international coordination and direction in specific areas through bodies such as the World Health Organisation (WHO), UNHCR and United Nations Educational Social and Cultural Organisation (UNESCO). The permanent membership of the UN Security Council is likely to expand, but it will struggle to deal with conflict and tension. Other global institutions will face considerable challenges.
2010
Global strategic trends - out to 2040
UK, Ministry of Defence
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)
Global Health
By 2040, health will be recognised as a fundamental global issue. Acknowledgement that healthcare provision contributes to stability at local, national and global levels may lead to increased international investment in global health in order to reduce inequality and also provide positive opportunities for education and training. Such developments are unlikely to be rapid, but will be accelerated by high impact events, such as pandemics and episodes of mass migration.
2010
Global strategic trends - out to 2040
UK, Ministry of Defence