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2031 timeline contents 2031 - Much of Bangkok is being abandoned due to flooding | Global reserves of lead are running out | Web 4.0 is transforming the Internet landscape | Stem cell pharmacies are commonplace | Married couples are a minority | Chocolate has become a rare luxury
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2031 Much of Bangkok is being abandoned due to flooding Bangkok, with a population of over 12 million, has been sinking underwater for decades. By the early 2030s, it is facing a disaster of epic scale, with much of the city being abandoned.* This has occurred for various different reasons. First and foremost, the city is built on clay. When originally settled, the region was just swampy coastline, but today it is covered by skyscrapers, highways and urban development. The enormous weight of all this concrete and steel has been pushing down on the soft clay beneath, causing the soils to descend by up to 5.3cm per year. By 2010, part of the megalopolis was already under sea level, a trend that would only become worse in the following decades. The illegal tapping of groundwater has been another major factor. Many of the city's residents have been continuously pumping up groundwater - both for their own use and to sell as a commodity - removing a natural layer and resulting in further destabilisation of the soil. Rising sea levels due to global warming have been yet another factor, eroding the coastline at a rate of 4cm a year, while the increasing severity of monsoon rains has led to longer and more devastating floods. The explosive growth of Bangkok in recent decades (making it one of the fastest growing places in southeast Asia) has dealt a serious blow to the city's infrastructure. Areas of land that had in the early 20th century been used to absorb flood waters had vast suburbs and business districts built over them. Canals were filled in to make way for the rapid urbanisation of the Chao Praya River Delta. The weight of the city grew and grew, to the point where the soft soil it was built upon could simply no longer support it. By the early 2030s, large portions of the megalopolis are well below sea level. The government's response during this time has proven inadequate, a lack of clear policy doing little to help the overall situation,* while sea walls have been almost useless due to increasing erosion of the shore. The lowering of the city, combined with rising sea levels (over 20cm higher than in 2000), has resulted in whole districts of Bangkok being permanently abandoned. Over a million buildings, the majority residential, are rendered uninhabitable, forcing their occupants to move further inland. Many areas which have yet to be fully claimed by the sea have also been evacuated, as the regularity of flooding proved too costly for many. Shantytowns and refugee camps are forming outside the city, while the government struggles to adjust as the capital sinks. Thailand as a whole is going through a period of almost unimaginable stress at this time, a result of such huge population displacement. The political, economic and social upheaval in the region is having a significant impact on global GDP. Efforts are underway to save Bangkok's numerous historical monuments and artifacts, with some temples being moved inland and reconstructed in their entirety. Due to the scale of this disaster, however, much is lost. In the coming years, the situation for Bangkok will only worsen as more and more of the city is permanently flooded. By the end of this century, the entire city will be abandoned.*
Global reserves of lead are running out Lead is a carbon group element with high density, malleability, softness and ductility. Metallic lead is relatively rare in the Earth's crust, and so is usually processed from zinc, silver and copper ores. Like silver, lead has been in use by humans for thousands of years. It was widely exploited by the Roman empire and played a large role in the industrial revolution. World production doubled from 1850 to 1900, doubled again from 1900 to 1950, then doubled yet again from 1950 to 2000.* Due to its high density, it has often been used as a weight or ballast, as well as radiation shielding. It is also used in firearms and other weaponry. The bulk of lead is used in producing car batteries and similar, as well as in electrodes and high voltage wires. The primary producers are China, Australia, the United States, Canada and Kazakhstan. Lead is also a pollutant and can be hazardous to human health, being infamous for its older uses in paint and fuels. From the 18th to 21st centuries, environmental levels of lead increased more than 1,000-fold.* In terms of numbers of people exposed and the public health impact, it became one of the largest environmental medicine problems. Although regulations from the 1970s began to reduce the lead content in products and greatly cut exposure in the developed world, many developing countries still allowed its use. By the early 2030s, most reserves of lead are beginning to be exhausted.** Much of the recent increase in demand has come from China's growing automobile sector. Because about half of the supply comes from recycled scrap, improved recycling programs are able to carry demand in the short term. Fortunately, lead has ready alternatives for most of its uses including zinc, copper, iron and tungsten. However, some of these metals will soon be facing their own shortages too, necessitating the production of artificial replacements. Because of this, the 2030s sees an acceleration of global recycling efforts in order to avert a resource crunch.
Web 4.0 is transforming the Internet landscape Further convergence of the online and physical world has led to the emergence of "Web 4.0" - the next generation of internet. Semantic analyzing programs, having evolved into forms of AI, now perform a huge range of automated tasks for business, government and consumers. Running on massively parallel networks, these applications hunt for textual and visual data - combining the most subtle capabilities of humans (such as pattern recognition) with ways in which machines are already vastly superior (such as speed and memory).* In addition to serving as highly advanced search engines, they are playing a major function in the real world - gathering information from the array of sensors, cameras and other tracking devices now present in the environment, on vehicles, and even on people themselves. Although privacy and civil liberties issues are being raised, this new generation of IT promises to bring enormous benefits to society. Crimes are faster and easier to solve thanks to these intelligent virtual agents; transport and logistics are smoother and more efficient; resources can be managed and distributed more accurately. In addition, practically every physical document in existence has now been digitally encoded, backed up and archived online. This includes full copies of all books, journals, manuscripts and other literature ever published – forming a complete repository of human knowledge going back thousands of years. These documents can be retrieved and analysed using real-time speech commands, translated from any of the world's 6,000 languages and accessed via 3D holographic imaging. Web 4.0 is also democratising the Internet more than ever before. News agencies are finding themselves increasingly outmoded by bloggers and other social media when it comes to speed and accuracy of information.
Stem cell pharmacies are commonplace Stem cell pharmacies are now a common sight on high streets. These offer walk-in diagnosis, stem-cell collection and banking services for use in future medical crises. Cheap, personalised and targeted treatments are available for the rapid regeneration of body parts and organs.*
Married couples are a minority By now, marriage in the West has been reduced to a lifestyle choice enjoyed by a minority, rather than an essential institution of society. In the UK, for example, the married population has shrunk from almost 50% of adults in 2009, to just 41% now.* This trend began in the 1980s. Increasing pressures of work and money, together with the general stresses of the outside world (geopolitical, social and economic), are putting an ever-greater strain on couples. The decline of religious institutions has also played a part here. Unmarried partnerships no longer carry the stigma they once had. In addition, increasing numbers of people either working at home alone, or living with their parents, are making it difficult for some to meet potential partners. Another contributory factor is an explosion in the use of virtual reality - and other such technologies - which has led to increased isolation of the individual. People of all ages spend increasingly large amounts of their time engaged in highly immersive online experiences, requiring little or no interaction with the outside world. Of those who are married, the number of children per couple has declined in Western societies. Combined with increasing numbers of Muslim immigrants (who have higher numbers of children), this is significantly altering the demographic balance.
Chocolate has become a rare luxury By now, chocolate has become as rare and expensive as caviar, with even a single bar costing $10-15. Drought, soil depletion and diminishing harvests in Africa – where two-thirds of the world's cocoa is produced – have led to soaring prices. Cocoa is also competing for agricultural space with other commodities like palm oil, which is increasingly in demand for biofuels. Poor pay and working conditions have also been a factor. Many young farmers are now abandoning their lands and heading to the cities, in search of better and more highly-paid jobs.*
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References 1 Thailand, Sinking: Parts of Bangkok Could Be Underwater in 2030, TIME: 2 Bangkok at risk of sinking into the sea, The Guardian: 3 Bangkok is sinking, Global Post: 4 Lead Statistics, US Geological Survey: 5 Uses of Lead, Geology.com: 6 Earth's natural wealth: an audit, New Scientist: 7 5 Valuable Metals That Could Vanish by 2055, Environmental Graffiti: 8 Web 4.0,Trip Down the Rabbit Hole or Brave New World?, zmogo.com: 9 Stem
cell 'pharmacies' in the high street in 20 years, predicts expert, Daily Telegraph: 10 Married
couples to be minority within 20 years, Daily Telegraph: 11 "In
20 years, chocolate will be like caviar. It will become so rare and so
expensive that the average Joe just won't be able to afford it."
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