Most vital signs indicate that it is the era of transformational century of historic proportion that may determine the destiny of humanity; hence, transformational in the sectors should be accelerated for the socio-economic advancement of the country, so disclosed scholars in the field.
Desta Mebratu, Centre for Complex Systems at Stellenbosch University, said that it is a moment of systemic scarcity faced with confluence of Socio-economic and socio-ecological challenges of a global proportion resulting in a resource and carbon-constrained world. This is a time of institutional failure as existing dominant development paradigm and governance mechanisms have significantly failed in addressing existing and emerging challenges. And this is an era of emergent solutions and a time for growing body of disruptive technology and knowledge systems that could potentially provide long-term solutions to the key challenges.
Adding he noted that more than 70 percent of the infrastructure most African countries need for their development is yet to be built and hundreds of billion dollars is needed in the coming decade to fill existing infrastructure gaps. The choice of infrastructure made in the coming decade will determine African countries capacity to make the transition to an inclusive, low-carbon, climate resilient and resource efficient economy that improves the well-being of its people. Digitization of the global economy is expected to redefine economy of scale and have transformational effect on key systems including energy, manufacturing, and global supply chain systems in the coming decades. African countries have a unique leapfrogging opportunity to a more sustainable economy that have higher potential to create more jobs and reduce poverty provided that they make an informed decision on their infrastructural investment.
Regarding techno-economic drivers of the 21st century, he indicated that digitization as a result of the exponential development in the field of information and communication technology, digitization of the global economy has become one of the most defining drivers of the global economy in the twenty first century. Distributed renewable energy systems offer an unprecedented opportunity to address energy poverty and provide the basis for economic empowerment and eradication of poverty through a bottom-up process. Distributed manufacturing entails a transition from conventional mass production to mass customization that redefines economies of scale and promotes well-being through distributed economy networks. Self-organizing urban systems emergence of more stable and sustainable urban systems that operate as a self-organizing socioeconomic system that is adaptive and productive both in terms of job creation and livelihood provision.
It is important to focus on systems that ensure well-being rather than being tempted to focus on technologies themselves. It is very important to value human decision-making and agency and design systems that harness new technologies to give people more choice, opportunities, freedom and control over their lives. And also society should not resign itself to the inevitability of default options. Design thinking, guided by human centered design, as well as systems thinking approaches can help the world ´ Values as a feature not a bug. he stated.
He went on to say that ecological, Strengthen through resilience-building approaches in management and governance of social-ecological systems through ecosystem-based adaptation and nature-based solutions, is critical infrastructural development.
He further mentioned that energy policy and investment preference, to renewable energy development with particular focus on promotion of distributed energy systems Industry Develop eco-industrial parks that have strong vertical and horizontal integration with local and national economies as a basis for inclusive and sustainable industrialization, should be prioritized as well.
He further remarked that urban move, to smart urban infrastructure design and development that combines light-touch top-down planning with bottom-up initiatives that are spontaneous, adaptive and collaborative governance incorporate sustainability transition in African developmental states with a mandate and capabilities to facilitate new modes of governance within reconfigured inclusive polities, should be considerate.
Concerning the huge potential of Ethiopia, he pointed out that Ethiopia has huge potential of leapfrogging into an inclusive, climate resilient and resource efficient economy that effectively contributes to the improvement of the well-being of its people. This would require avoiding possible infrastructural lock-in that may result in stranded assets that may have least investment return at best or significant socio-economic socio-ecological damage at worst. Emerging technologies and knowledge systems create more favorable conditions for combining top-down strategic planning with bottom-up operational planning that create more jobs and reduce poverty at the local level. Ethiopia’s possibility for transformative development is dependent on its ability to create a dynamic innovation space that is responsive to the specific context of resource and needs of its people.
The Ethiopian Herald April 19/ 2020
BY MEHARI BEYENE
