Nostradamus of the 21st century, Bill Gates, has repeatedly been right in his predictions of world trends, social change and technological advances. What, in his opinion, will happen in the next 20 years? In his past predictions, Bill Gates was practically a prophet: his 1999 list was incredibly accurate. He foresaw the emergence of price comparison sites, smartphones, social media and bots. Over the past few years, in interviews and annual messages, he continues to predict the future. Here are seven of his latest forecasts.
In the next 15 years, 33 million people will die out in less than a year because of the pathogen.
At the Munich Security Conference, Gates warned that "epidemiologists are saying that a rapidly moving pathogen can kill more than 30 million people in less than a year". This can happen because of a mutation, accident or intention of terrorists. Although now it seems strange, similar events have happened in the past: the most obvious example is the "black death", which destroyed one third of Europe. More recently, in 1918, Spanish influenza destroyed between 50 and 100 million people.
Africa will become fully self-sufficient in food production.
Gates believes that Africa will achieve this goal due to a number of structural changes:.
First, the best fertilizers and cultivated crops will lead to an upward spiral of better nutrition, which will lead to increased productivity.
Secondly, the development of the infrastructure that is already underway, such as increasing the width of the highways in Ghana and the elimination of the checkpoints in Senegal, will reduce the number of delays in the supply of products and other goods.
Third, since the phones are becoming more accessible, information like weather forecasts and market prices will be disseminated.
Life of the poor will change mobile banking.
The electronic banking system will allow poor people to store and save money in digital form. In the annual message of 2015, Gates said that "by 2030, 2 billion people who do not have a permanent bank account will keep money and make payments using their phones".
In 2035, poor countries will cease to exist.
Gates talks about how much the world has changed for his life - moved from a world divided into the Soviet Union, Western allies and "all the rest", to the world we see today - calling this a precedent for the possibility of change. In his message of 2014, he wrote that "assistance is a fantastic investment, and we need to help more. It saves and improves lives in an effective way, paving the way for long-term economic progress ".
By 2030, there will be an energy breakthrough that will turn our world around.
Relatively recently, in 2016, Gates did not name any of the existing methods of extracting renewable energy as a panacea, but believes that the key lies in investing in young people. He himself has already invested $ 2 billion in alternative technologies.
A lot of jobs will be lost to machines.
In an interview with Quartz, Bill Gates, like many industry leaders, introduced a world in which people cease to be robots. Gates, however, provided a possible plan of action: taxing robots to finance more jobs that only people can work on, such as caring for the elderly or working with children.
Poliomyelitis will be defeated around the world by 2018.
In his annual letter of 2013, Gates showed statistics that the prevalence of poliomyelitis has dropped from millions of people in hundreds of countries to activity in just three countries around the world. The key, according to him, lies in the dimensions. "You need to accurately measure, and also create an environment in which problems can be discussed openly so that you can effectively assess what works and what does not".