These technologies are changing the nature of development
Pollution is a worldwide problem, from air pollution that threats the health of those who breathe the contaminated air, to plastic pollution that is having a huge impact in the oceans and its ecosystems, we face an unprecedent challenge when talking about pollution. To tackle the multiple problems that pollution brings to the environment and our health, new solutions are needed. Some of the innovations that are showcased in this e-book have helped to make the difference.
Some of those innovations are improving air pollution levels. For instance, there have been several giant outside vacuum cleaners to filter dirty air in China that transform the carbon present in the air to diamonds. This invention is able to suck in air from a 300-meter radius and up to seven kilometers upwards, which means that it could treat some 800,000 cubic meters of air in an hour, filtering out 100% of fine particles and 95% of ultra-fine particles.
To reduce plastic pollution in one of the most polluted areas of the world, the south Asian countries have also turned to cryptocurrencies, managed by a mobile-based blockchain app that have been proved useful to reduce plastic pollution by creating a system that provides a consistent, above-market rate for plastic waste, incentivizing its collection so individuals who gather plastic can trade it for money, items or services. Then the collected plastic is recycled and sold to make new products, such as feedstock for 3D printers. There have been recovered over 10 million pounds of ocean-bound plastic as of June 8, 2019, the equivalent to over 272 million plastic bottles, and at the same time, there have been created thousands of jobs in developing nations. (www.plasticbank.com)
Other example is that of the private company called The Ocean Cleanup. They have created a floating system designed to collect the macro plastics that float on the pacific patch. Their models and projections indicate that their system fully deployed could clean up 50% of the Great Pacific Garbage Patch in 5 years. (2019 The Ocean Cleanup. https://theoceancleanup.com)
Human activities have a huge impact on environment and very often this impact means degradation of the ecosystem. There are multiple examples of depletion of forests and watersheds due to economic exploitation, ranging from deforestation in the amazons to grow palm trees, to tar sands in Alberta Canada to obtain fossil fuels, that put a high pressure over biodiversity due to the destruction of their habitats and ecosystems. These images show how dramatically human activity can change the landscape and the ecosystem of an area.
Several companies and research institutes such as the Indian Institute of Science Bangalore, are planting trees using drones to reforest large areas of land. Thanks to the use of UAVs it is possible to have a more precise image of the area to be seeded, and it is possible to plant a mix of seeds in difficult access areas in less time than using traditional methods. Also, this technology allows monitoring the results to ensure trees are growing according to the plan. https://www.thecivilengineer.org/news-center/latest-news/item/1388-planting-trees-using-drones-is-being-tested-in-india
There are other successful applications of new technologies for conservation, such as robotics and remote sensing. One of them is the monitorization of wildlife, which is intended to boost efforts to conserve species and protect ecosystems from depletion. A successful application is the case of the pink dolphin in the amazon river, that faced an uncertain future due to pollution, dam construction, poaching and bycatch. This project led by WWF, not only addresses the urgent need to conserve the species, but also provides vital information for the conservation of freshwater ecosystems. The population of those animals is steady and increasing thanks to the conservation efforts that have been done. http://wwf.panda.org/wwf_news/successes/?335390/River-dolphins-in-Peru-satellite-tagged-for-first-time
Global access to a clean and reliable source of fresh water is a challenge for many. Not only because of draughts but also due to flooding crisis and a deficient management of water reservoirs. This is consequence of multiple factors, such as climate change, pollution and hazardous events, but the result is the same everywhere: social instability, poor crops, infrastructure damage and adverse health issues on communities.
In Israel, the southern and eastern areas are characterized by an arid climate which exposes those regions to water scarcity. To tackle this challenge, they have turn to desalinization to have a reliable source of water. The country now gets more than 55% of its domestic water from desalination, which has helped to turn Israel, one of the world’s driest countries into a water giant. The Zuckerberg Institute founded at the Ben-Gurion University of the Negev, has conducted some pioneering researches on new techniques in drip irrigation, water treatment and desalination. https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/israel-proves-the-desalination-era-is-here/"
Climate change is the cause of wildfires, draughts, floods, hurricanes, extreme heat but also unexpected weather changes that threat crops and daily life. Every corner of the world is experimenting the effects of the climate change, but some areas are more vulnerable not having the infrastructure and the means to respond these sudden changes. Natural disasters are the first and most dramatic consequence of the climate change, and to reduce their incidence, long-term oriented policies and actions must be adopted as soon as possible. Some countries are already tackling the problem by limiting the permitted carbon emissions, banning single-use plastics and encouraging the use of clean energy, but that is not enough to tackle the immediate challenges that this situation is posing.
Some of the Disruptive technologies that are helping to mitigate the adverse effects of climate change are those that are oriented to prevent and manage disaster risks in vulnerable areas. In this area is especially relevant the Internet of Things. The installation of multiple sensors and weather stations can help to address the emergency before the consequences become catastrophic, by sending the required information to decision makers, communities and first responders, and helping to save hundreds of lives.
Also, for the long-term challenges posed by climate change, technology can be also the answer to tackle them. One success story is the one that comes from Morocco. The growing investments in renewable sources together with the elimination of many fossil fuel subsidies have made the country a leader in renewable energy sources and it is helping to limit its energetic footprint.
Oceans are suffering the worst impact of the climate change consequences. From plastic pollution to depletion of marine ecosystems there are many threats to the oceans. While some of them, such as the rising sea level due to climate change, require long term policies and a strong international commitment to change our current behavior to stop them, others can be tackled in easier ways. Oceans contain 99% of the living space on the planet by volume, and in all the different ecosystems that can be found in the different areas of the ocean, thrive an uncountable number of different species, many of them yet to be discovered. And yet human activity poses a serious threat to this biodiversity. Despite marine protected areas having expanded in number and size 31.4% of fish stocks are currently overfished.
However, new technologies are helping with some of the challenges affecting the oceans. By equipping boats with sensors and other equipment to collect relevant data and making them capable to analyze it right away, it is becoming easier to track the fisheries and their health. This is essential to respect the shares established to guarantee the health of the fishery and preserve biodiversity and the ecosystems.
One of the main challenges for agriculture is being able to satisfy the growing need of nutrients and food that the global population will demand. By 2050 there will be 9 billion of people and it will be necessary to produce 60% more food. Famines are still an actual problem in many fragile countries, and according to The State of Food Security and Nutrition in the World 2018 an UN publication, one in every nine people is going to suffer hunger, mainly in South American and African countries, and this numbers are still growing. Even though many progresses have been made in agriculture to make crops more productive and resilient, there are still many inefficient exploitations and many vulnerable areas, exposed to natural disaster or weather severities, that ruin the crops and render communities vulnerable. New technologies are required to tackle this problem and to face the incoming challenges of an increasingly growing population.
There are many innovations that can help with this problem. One is vertical farming. This new way to approach farming is the practice of producing food in controlled, indoor environments that allows factory style precision agriculture and can reduce the environmental impact and reduce the influence of environmental variability on crop production. With this innovation, the production it is estimated to be ten times higher per acre than which is obtained using conventional techniques. Also, for crops that are not suitable for this technique because it is not efficient, precision agriculture is the new trend in the field that is helping to strength crops’ resilience. This include a wide range of techniques that allow increasing productivity and reducing the risks of losing the harvest thanks to remote sensing technology combined with computer-based applications that can be used to create precise farm plans.
The main challenges that transport and mobility are facing are avoiding congestion and ensuring access to everyone. Transport is an essential daily activity for a a well-functioning economy and connecting communities. Today there are plenty of problems affecting this economic area, from bad designing to old and obsolete infrastructures that are not providing adequate solutions and that can become a danger in case of weather severities. Another challenge that faces worldwide transport is to tackle emissions. Transport is also accountable for 23% of the world’s energy-related CO2 emissions. This is a significant share and reducing it would help to reduce the impact of combustion in the environment.
New urban ideas for vehicles can improve mobility, this is the case of sharing bike companies. Bikeshares and E-bikes have had already success in Asia, helping to reduce congestion in big cities. To successfully tackle urban problems, they have to be a real alternative to cars, so they have to be reasonably priced and situated in accessible public locations to make simpler to pick up a bike than choosing a car. From China there are more valuable lessons, such as the developing industry of electric cars, supported by government policies aimed to reduce pollution in cities.
Energy is the motor of the economy and therefore it is central for development. One of the biggest problems in the developing world is the lack of reliable access to energy or even worse, the total absence of it. On the other hand, often the available sources of energy for these communities are not safe and put their health at risk. But also, places where the access to energy is no longer a challenge, the source itself is a threat for the environment. Energy accounts for around 60% of total global greenhouse gas emissions according to the UN. In many places around the world, not only in developing countries, governments have been subsidizing fossil fuel production and consumption. These subsidies entail enormous costs, due to economic inefficiency, inequality, air pollution and climate change.
But there are successful experiences reducing fossil fuel dependence and unreliable energy access thanks to the use of technology. One very good example of this is Morocco, that reduced its reliance on imported fossil fuels turning to renewable energy taking advantage of its southern region. The major sources of alternative energy are solar and wind. Its outstanding solar program aims to generate 2 gigawatts of solar power by the year 2020 by building five mega-scale solar power projects with modern solar thermal, photovoltaic and concentrated solar power mechanisms. This program will increase by 14% the role of solar energy in total electricity capacity by 2020 and prevent the emission of 3.7 million tons of CO ² per year. The wind program is also intended to generate another additional 2 gigawatts by 2020 thanks to the construction of 10 new more wind energy farms. With those programs Morocco will reduce its consumption of fossil fuels and therefore its dependency on other countries becoming more self-sufficient, but also will lower carbon emissions. By 2020 the country hopes to have 42% of installed power generation capacity by renewable energy resources and by 2030, more than half of its energy will be generated by renewables.
Urban population is growing at high rates, it is expected that by 2050, the urban population will double its current size, and nearly 7 of 10 people in the world will live in cities. That poses an important challenge in terms of property, mainly in developing countries where land tenures are not always properly regulated. It is estimated that only 30% of the world’s population has legally registered rights to their lands and homes, and that harnesses economic growth. People need to be identified and localized to have access to new labor opportunities or sometimes to benefit from the most essential human rights.
One of the first steps to delimit property is to have an address. One way to create addresses where the urbanization is not organized, and the communities are underserved is by the creation of a digitalized addresses system that locates in exactly the same way the coordinates of a point. That would allow people to be localized even in the smallest and narrowest dwelling. Combined with a google maps-based app and the work of a local ONG every dwelling was identified with a unique code that is the universal address for each home.
In Tanzania drones have been used to secure land rights. That allows to map the area in detail not only for risk management purposes, but the images of a very high resolution allowed the government to determine and define correctly the boundaries of the ground. Then it was possible to delimit land for farmers and end conflicts related to property disputes. This brings social stability but also a predictable legal and economic environment which will allow to boost local economy.
As population grows by the years, the number of people suffering from poverty does too despite the efforts to eradicate. The latest projections show that the world will not be able to eradicate extreme poverty by 2030. The main problem is the difficulty to reach the most vulnerable people who often live in fragile countries and remote areas. Also, the instability and high risks exposure in some countries due to social conflicts and recurrent climatic disasters, make the way out of poverty even more difficult and not durable for those who finally have access to a better life. This is particularly more acute in southern Asia and sub-Saharan Africa regions.
To deal with the challenges that poverty poses, new technologies can show new ways of changing lives for better. There are many ways involving blockchain and fintech as we have seen before in other development sectors, such as exchanging cryptocurrency for plastics or catalyzing investments to local farmers. This helps the monetary flow to reach every person having a phone and internet connection, no matter where in the productive chain they are. But also new technologies are useful to identify where are the most vulnerable areas, so the entities working on reducing poverty can focus their efforts where they are needed the most. Using aggregated and encrypted cell phone call data will reduce the cost of estimating poverty, which usually relies on conducting and analyzing household surveys and population censuses that are both expensive and administratively demanding. This big data model analyze has been applied to Guatemala by the World Bank Group and can be used for any place thanks to the meteoric growth of telecommunication networks in developing countries.
Health is a challenge for every economy in the world, it is estimated than less than a half the people have access to the health services they need, and this is not limited to developing countries, but surely, those economies less developed, struggle the most to provide universal health care to their nationals. Also due to the lack of capacity to guarantee the basic assistance, many otherwise extinguished diseases keep threating lives of the most vulnerable. In 2016, everyday 15,000 children died before reaching their fifth birthday, again four out of every five deaths of those children occur in Sub-Saharan Africa and Southern Asia.
Health is one of the most urgent and dramatic challenges that face our society. Is one of the most fundamental rights of every human being because it is closely related to the right to live itself. One way to reduce the impact of lack of access to sanitation and health care in fragile areas, is using the disruptive technologies. One of the very best options is using drones to reach communities that dwell in remote areas or located in difficult access places. Those drones can supply medication but also blood for surgeries and that can be a life changing game.
Another innovation that can make the difference between life and death is an early diagnosis of diseases like malaria. There are multiple innovations that allow to do this in a faster and cheaper way than using traditional methods. That ranges from a simple urine test, to using magnetics to detect the infection or using smartphones. Everything contributes to improve the prompt diagnosis of this disease that important for having a successful treatment.
Other innovation that can change life for many are 3D printable prosthetic devices. With free data bases provided by public organisms like the NIH (3D-Printable Prosthetic Devices database) it is possible to print new prosthetics and improve life quality for many, and this is especially critical for those who live in conflict zones, reducing the costs and time lapse of manufacturing traditional prosthetic devices.
Even though education has experienced a steady progress and the number of children that are schooled is increasing, there are still many challenges that society must to address to ensure that this education is adequate and effective. Education is not only simply going to classroom but receiving proper instruction and stimulus to acquire the skills that they need to thrive in modern world and in their communities. Children that are exposed to poverty and conflict often suffer more from lack of opportunities and that is especially recurrent in Sub-Saharan Africa, where almost 90% of students do not have the minimum skills in reading and math.
The role of disruptive technologies in education is growing more and more, in two different ways. First is essential for children to properly learn tech-related skills, as the jobs of the future are likely to require these abilities. On the other hand, technology can bring education to many children around the world that now do not have access to education, or where the means available are not suitable to teach them all the skills they need to acquire.
To bring opportunities everywhere, cloud services allow access to education to a wide range of areas and it is only needed access to internet and a computer or a smartphone to receive classes. Platforms of Massive Open Online Courses (MOOC) that gather courses from the most prestigious institutions and allow people from everywhere to have access to knowledge that otherwise would be inaccessible, and that is all for free or for a little price. In 2018 there were 11,400 courses from more than 900 universities from all over the world and this kind of courses had 101 million students. The growth of these platforms is steady and shows the value that they have for society. That can be applied to smaller scales, giving remote lessons to children that lives in areas that are not easy to reach, such as the initiative called school in the cloud that allows children from all over the world to have access to education.
Regarding financial inclusion, is important to distinguish between the use of and access to financial services. There are many reasons why individuals or small business could decide not to use financial services (because of cultural or religious reasons, or because they do not need it). However, being involuntarily excluded from the use of financial services is a huge challenge that it is closely related to poverty in the modern world, as transactions and economic opportunities rely more and more on financial services rather than on simple exchange of goods or cash.
Innovations in this area never stop. This is a very dynamic sector that is constantly benefitting from disruptions and new technologies to modernize the way of doing things. And fortunately, this is having an impact on developing countries. Access to new tools to have access to finance is increasing and is contributing to make significant improvements in small communities that otherwise would not have had access to financial means to boost their business. There are platforms like Thrive Agric in Nigeria that allows investors to choose a farm from those who participate in this platform and select the crop they want to fund and after harvesting, collect their returns. That allows farmers to access finance and help their business grow.
There are also applications created to build payments infrastructure to connect Africa to the global economy, like the one created by the company Flutterwave. They intend to cerate a platform that can make and accept any payment anywhere from across Africa and around the world. This is very useful to promote safe financial transactions and to help merchants to increase their businesses by easing the way they charge their clients. This is coming hand by hand with the increasing use of mobile money services by African population a simpler way to manage their accounts. So far they have reach 50 banks in Africa and have processed already 100 million transactions.