In the future we´ll have to face known problems such as poverty, lack of food and demand for energy as well as new challenges made by the shortage of water, the destruction of biodiversity associated with the deterioration of the environment (on an unprecedented scale), the increase and mobility of the world population and moral problems related to the aplications of new technologies to the health sciences.
For the first time the world has about a billion people over 60 years, able to live healthfully and fully the third stage of his life.
Their relative concentration in the most advanced economies creates new labor patterns and new markets, as well as poses a series of fiscal challenges in their countries to finance such longevity with health-related benefits from the so-called “Welfare State”.
It will not necessarily be a more “adult” world. In the year 2000, the planet was inhabited by 6,100 million inhabitants, which by 2012 had already become 7,000 million. 43% were under 25 years old (in some countries that proportion even reaches 60%) with the most of them living in emerging economies.
Population growth will accelerate in the coming years as well as the proportion of the young population, while people will continue to migrate to the cities.
How are we going to create employment and ensure access to education, health and a decent life for around 8 billion people as of 2020?
It will be difficult to find the answers in the 20th century´s economy. Its emblematic sectors (such as automotive, electronics, etc.) have reached technological maturity and need less labor than before.
New emblematic sectors (biotechnology, renewable energies, etc.) and new business models (such as global value chains in knowledge-based services, crowdsourcing, etc.) triggered by the latest technological developments are revolutionizing ways of working and produce by promoting a new group of entrepreneurs, whose presence is becoming increasingly relevant to develop new businesses and trades as well as in the exercise of social tasks and, even, in the management of the public sector.
