Trends Identified
Sensors
Sensing technologies will capture data from our physical world and make it available as digital information. They will continue to become smaller, smarter and, in some cases, self-powering.
2017
Surfing the digital tsunami
Australia, Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation (CSIRO)
Share, exchange & analyse
Humans will increasingly generate data from their explicit (e.g. social media) and implicit (e.g. web browsing) digital activities. The internet is powerful in connecting, optimising and enabling collaborative consumption, however, we leave many traces. Where monopolies emerge, privacy is an issue.
2017
Surfing the digital tsunami
Australia, Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation (CSIRO)
Store and process
Today we are seeing an increasing amount of data and computation migrate from our personal devices onto cloud platformsc. Many websites rely on basic cloud service building blocks provided by companies such as Amazon.
2017
Surfing the digital tsunami
Australia, Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation (CSIRO)
User interface
The way we interact with technology has a huge impact on our productivity. Key examples include the mouse, the touch screen, and most recently, voice communication systems like Siri. Connecting voluminous data and computational power with our physical and biological reality will become ever more seamless and sophisticated. User interfaces will become more natural and in tune with natural human behaviour.
2017
Surfing the digital tsunami
Australia, Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation (CSIRO)
Machine / robotics Automating common tasks
Machines and robotics are endowed with AI (programmed algorithms) to ful l set tasks and goals. These generally fall into two key categories: ‘speci c task-based AI’ (e.g. a web search engine or an autonomous vehicle) and ‘general AI’ that aims to replicate aspects of human intelligence (e.g. IBM’s Watson or humanoid robots like Honda’s ASIMO).
2017
Surfing the digital tsunami
Australia, Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation (CSIRO)
Internet infrastructure The backbone of our communications
The backbone ‘hard’ infrastructure that supports the ow of data across space will be under pressure to cope with tra c demands.
2017
Surfing the digital tsunami
Australia, Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation (CSIRO)
An ageing global population
The world is facing an ageing population due to a combination of increased life expectancy and declining fertility rates. As dependency ratios shift with growing elderly populations, governments will be faced with falling saving rates, falling consumption, and growing pressure on social services. There are stark differences in demographic changes between developed countries and developing countries. In general, high-income countries are experiencing population stagnation or decline. Conversely, many developing countries, particularly in sub-Saharan Africa, are experiencing “youth bulges” and expansion of working-age population. Both demographic scenarios pose challenges for governments seeking to create policies that are economically sustainable and politically palatable.
2017
Global trends to 2035
European Strategy and Policy Analysis System (ESPAS)
Fragile globalisation in a multipolar world
Fears about weakening enthusiasm for globalisation have, seemingly, been realised in the past few years. However, there are numerous variables that will shape whether the purported anti- trade environment of 2016 lasts to 2035. In the most likely scenario, globalisation patterns will be shaped less by politics and more by structural factors. Global trade is steady as a percentage of global growth, likely due to China’s reorientation towards domestic consumption and the maturing of trade in goods. A more services-oriented economy will have different requirements for global trade governance, but Beijing, Brussels, and Washington will remain the key decision points for global economic affairs.
2017
Global trends to 2035
European Strategy and Policy Analysis System (ESPAS)
Industrial and technological revolution
By 2035, technological advances will have a major impact on the social and economic foundations of society, potentially more far-reaching than the initial phase of computerisation from the 1980s onwards. Technologies involving automation and machine learning have the potential to disrupt job markets, making millions of jobs obsolete. As technologies like self- driving cars begins to proliferate, governments at all levels will be faced with questions of adaptation, governance, and human development. Countries will be forced to consider how much of their core information infrastructure they will permit to be run by companies domiciled in other countries. Parties may be faced with a trade-off between protecting consumers’ privacy and encouraging the growth of artificial intelligence firms that rely on large amount of data for training and improving algorithms. The question of when platform companies achieve monopolistic power will be a key issue brought before the court system in many countries.
2017
Global trends to 2035
European Strategy and Policy Analysis System (ESPAS)
Climate change and resource competition
Changes in the global climate due to rising greenhouse gases will not be reversed by 2035, even if great strides are made with the implementation of political agreements to greatly reduce carbon usage in the future. As the consequences of climate change become increasingly apparent -- and natural events such as famines and water strain become linked to climate change in popular discourse -- the world is likely to see climate-related political disputes proliferate at the national and international level. Renewable energy will proliferate and become cost-competitive around the world, but will trigger instability in countries dependent on fossil fuels, many of which are in Europe’s neighbourhood.
2017
Global trends to 2035
European Strategy and Policy Analysis System (ESPAS)