Half way through the World in 2030 here are ten innovation challenges for the next decade. A talk at ISPIM 2020 on 8 June will share more details and seed further dialogue on these and other issues on the horizon as the world deals with both pandemics, climate change and pervasive data. For more information on the ISPIM event see https://www.ispim-virtual.com For more foresights from Future Agenda research since 2010 see www.futureagenda.org

1. The World in 2030: Innovation Challenges for the Next Decade
Insights From Multiple Expert Discussions Around The World
8 June 2020

2. Future Agenda
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informed decisions and place better, strategic growth bets. We help companies
recognise how changes in the external world may impact them and their sector.
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3. The World in 2020
The first global Future Agenda programme in 2010 was hosted by Vodafone.
Fifty workshops across 16 topics in 25 locations with 1500 experts identified a
wide range of 10-year shifts, over 80% of which have now come to pass.
Lease Everything Global Pandemics
Active Elderly People TrackingDrone Wars

4. The World in 2025
A second larger programme in 2015 was supported by 50 organisations.
120 workshops in 45 cities engaged with over 5000 experts across 24 topics.
Issues identified have become a central focus for major innovation globally.
Plastic Oceans Air Quality
Energy Storage Value of DataTruth and Illusion

5. World in 2030
The third programme is taking place during 2020, engaging more experts on the
pivotal shifts via virtual workshops and wider community discussion / debate.
Here are ten issues so far that provide innovation challenge and opportunity.

6. Orchestrating Serendipity
With more technology-enabled but physically dispersed working, provoking
moments of creative tension, inspiration and serendipity is a rising challenge.
Organisations seek means to better drive spontaneity and so seed innovation.

7. Broader Decision Making
As the world faces complex future challenges, multi-party
communities are themselves expanding and fragmenting.
New approaches to broader decision-making gain traction.

8. Proof of Immunity
Public concerns about health security override worries about privacy.
Governments integrate immunity and health data with national identities.
Insufficient regulatory control risks the possibility of pervasive surveillance.

9. Sharing Spaces
People are increasingly unwilling to share space with unvalidated strangers.
For automated transport, designing solutions that will provide flexibility and
privacy are pivotal to building user acceptance of new business models.

10. Resilience by Design
Global supply chains evolve to be more flexible, shared regional supply webs.
Manufacturing shifts from centralised production to a smaller and distributed
approach. Competitors access shared, not proprietary, networks and systems.

11. Data Sovereignty
Large-population emerging economies see the protection of their data as a
national priority, so they can grow the economy and maintain cultural identity.
Wider sharing and use of data is restricted to be within national borders.

12. Migrating Diseases
With 2oC of global warming probable and 4oC possible, health systems struggle
to address the growing impact of climate change. The increased spread of
vector borne diseases joins poor air quality as a major public health threat.

13. Soil Quality
Soil is fundamental, fragile and finite. It impacts everything from food and
health to conflict and migration. Deeper understanding of its degrading quality
raises soil’s significance to equal that of climate change and biodiversity loss.

14. Carbon Sequestration
Cutting greenhouse-gas emissions won’t be enough to prevent sharp increases
in global temperatures. What we need is a cheap way to permanently store the
billions of tons of carbon dioxide that we need to pull out of the atmosphere.

15. Electric Aviation
As the pressure to decarbonise aviation builds, using electric planes for short /
medium-haul flights gathers support. There are major technological challenges
to address, but investment and regulation align to accelerate development.

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