THE STORM AHEAD The Fourth Industrial Revolution gives us an opportunity to to use technology to transform traditional sectors and systems to address climate change
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PARTICULARLY damning Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change report, released in August, presented a grim prognosis for the planet. We find ourselves in a situation where climate change has already done irreversible damage to the planet. In response to the report, UN Secretary-General António Guterres said this was nothing less than “a code red for humanity... the alarm bells are
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deafening, and the evidence is irrefutable”. The flooding in parts of Germany and in New York around the release of the report, coupled with wildfires and unprecedented temperatures across the world, have certainly been a tangible and visceral indication of this. This research emerges as we enter a new era – the Fourth Industrial Revolution (4IR). Not only do we have more access to information than ever before, but we also see a confluence of cyber, physical
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BY PROFESSOR TSHILIDZI MARWALA, vice-chancellor and principal of the University of Johannesburg. He is the author of books such as Closing the Gap: The Fourth Industrial Revolution in Africa and Leading in the 21st Century.
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