UAE Government, World Economic Forum launch ‘Sustainable Development

The UAE Government has launched the Sustainable Development Agenda initiative, in collaboration with the World Economic Forum (WEF), during the second Annual Meeting of the Global Future Councils (AMGFC), held in Madinat Jumeirah under the patronage of the Vice President, Prime Minister and Ruler of Dubai, His Highness Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum, on November 11-12, 2017.

The Agenda promotes a set of global values that must be established in order to make responsible decisions when developing technologies that can then be used to the benefit of society. It introduces new models for governments, as well as innovative approaches to develop existing government models, which serves to maximise the benefits and mitigate the potential risks from the Fourth Industrial Revolution.

The Sustainable Development Agenda, which is based on eight strategic sectors, seeks to optimise the use of Fourth-Industrial-Revolution technologies to affect positive changes, in addition to developing methods to forecast the future of strategic sectors. The Agenda builds on the key takeaways from the Annual Meeting of the Global Future Councils, highlighting key opportunities for cooperation across various technological sectors.

Mohammed Abdullah Al Gergawi, Minister of Cabinet Affairs and The Future and AMGFC Co-Chair, said: "The Sustainable Development Agenda is a standardised set of guidelines for governments around the world, helping them embrace and implement Fourth-Industrial-Revolution technologies, while also serving as a tool to address the challenges that come along with it."

"We are on the verge of a new era spearheaded by the Fourth Industrial Revolution," Al Gergawi added. "Radical changes are in the pipeline – changes that are set to affect work environments, production processes, management systems and governance. These transformations will reinvent governments in the future. This Agenda offers a bold vision for the future of vital sectors and a roadmap for the governments of the world to develop proactive solutions for the challenges that are likely to arise."

The Sustainable Development Agenda revolves around eight strategic sectors that employ Fourth-Industrial-Revolution technologies to transform people’s lives, in addition to offering forecasting mechanisms for the highly strategic sectors that most affect human life.

For the first sector, the labour market, the Agenda asserts there will be a greater integration of smart machines, which will require a full overhaul of the labour market to fully utilise people’s skills and capacities. In healthy living and healthcare, the Agenda projects that personalised medicine and human-enhancement technologies will push average life expectancy beyond 90 years. Meanwhile, in food sustainability, Fourth-Industrial-Revolution technologies will ensure that the basic nutritional needs of a global population of 8.5 billion are met, while simultaneously working to minimise the environmental footprint this would entail.

The Agenda also works to fully decarbonise energy worldwide, whereas in investments and infrastructure, it forecasts a world where the widespread adoption of electric and autonomous transport – as well as additive manufacturing – will have fundamentally shifted infrastructure needs, particularly in urban environments. In trade and value chains, circular and zero-waste value chains will be implemented worldwide, while large-scale human mobility will become increasingly commonplace due to demographic, technological and climate impacts. In the eighth and final sector, ubiquitous information, open data is expected to grow in scope, requiring stricter cybersecurity measures.

The Sustainable Development Agenda outlines a set of global values that must be established to make responsible decisions in technology development, steering it towards the wellbeing of society. The Agenda presents new government models that are innovative, thorough and inclusive, outlining steps to follow in order to transform current government models to fully capitalise on the Fourth Industrial Revolution.

The UAE Government is organising the second Annual Meeting of the Global Future Councils in partnership with the World Economic Forum (WEF) – Davos, welcoming more than 700 scientists and future experts from 75 countries, who will convene in 35 different councils to tackle key issues and challenged in a number of highly strategic sectors.