Rising Industries 21st Century Parents Should Know About
By: Cocoon Foundation
Tags: Entrepreneurship, Industry, 21st Century, Parents

With the world changing at a rapid pace, new sets of questions call for new ways of solving problems. The invention of the portable computer and the phone in your lifetime revolutionized the way we communicate, however, these inventions became the default in your child’s lives in an instant. For example, it’s also almost taken for granted the way you can just Google something online for answers when you had to sift through library books or encyclopedias back in the day. With information as well as keeping up to date with others at your fingertips, the way your child’s generation can access information brings about curiosity at convenience. With an array of tools already at our disposal, understanding the potential areas of growth will prove beneficial to expanding your child’s horizons and contributing to make meaningful work. Now, your child’s generation’s career drives will almost certainly involve making an impact as Gen Zs are truth-seekers and more conscious about the values behind companies. Here are some thriving industries we think you should know about:

Environmental industries that put the world in our hands

Food tech is moving upstream

With young role models such as Greta Thunberg and HK local 10-year-old climate activist Lance Lau, our children’s generation have a stronger sense of environmental awareness with an urgency to act sooner. Changing the way we eat is one way people are looking to make an environmental change one bite at a time. Hong Kong McDonald’s collaboration with OmniPork is just one example that alternative meats are paving their way into mainstream diets. With the livestock sector being more responsible for carbon emissions over transport, alternative proteins or plant-based meats is a growing field where the food industry is focusing on upstream processes. Following on from how we can change our diets to reduce environmental impact, one way to go about is to ensure that we minimize food waste where we can. Strong efforts are made to create circular solutions to reduce surplus food that contributes to a destructive environmental effect.

Smart materials

With Apple’s recent iPhone 12 launch, they announced that they will not include chargers and earphones in their packaging. This move increases awareness of cutting down waste on a large scale on a commercial level. However, the need for biodegradable materials is still needed. Scientists are developing a wide range of materials from low-carbon cement to smart fertilizers in order to minimize the industry’s carbon footprints where they can.

From the way we consume food or material goods, this generation demands companies to be responsible for the waste they create. Therefore, Gen Zs can expect entering industries at a time of transition, where companies are adapting environmental elements into their existing systems. Gen Zs would benefit from further understanding of production processes or the policy space to bring a tangible environmental change.

Tech closening our connections

Closing the distance for communications

With the pandemic at hand, we have seen firsthand the importance of tech to bring people together virtually. With the adoption of 5G, the next-generation fastest wireless technology to date, industries, and applications of telepresence can see possibilities. This can be especially seen in the healthcare space, telemedicine to help with real-time remote operations to a diagnosis over a video call on an app — or even virtual clinical trials. Also with an aging population, particularly in Asian countries, there appears to be a move to create social robots in the geriatric space to reduce loneliness and foster connection when it can’t be provided.

On a consumer level, the benefits of fast connections are also incorporated into brand marketing strategies such as live streaming to tell a brand story or share beneficial educational clips in a society that thrives with communication — furthermore ensuring that communications transmitted are reliable, authentic, and truthful.

Closing the distance for travel

To further increase mobility, and close the distance of travel, mode transport is something that Asia is pouring more research into. Self-driving cars as well as developing batteries for electric vehicles will be something that people will look into in the coming years. Electric vehicles run on electric motors instead of an internal combustion engine which means no fossil fuels are needed for pollution-free travel. With Tesla’s 415% rising stock value since January, electric vehicle sales are expected to reach over half (58%) of global passenger vehicle sales in 20 years.

We can see that tech companies are using digital transformation to build more efficient ways of bringing people together — from health to travel. Gen Zs can envision a collaborative future that will rely more on virtual possibilities and should not hold themselves back in exploring beyond what they can see in front of them.

Navigating digital spaces for expression

Following on from how current and future tech emphasizes bringing people together, digital spaces are not only places where communities can be formed they are places of increasing importance when it comes to expressing views, and following trends to form opinions on important matters. There’s no denying that there’s a whole new realm of changemakers in the social media space coined KOLs or influencers. The future industrial landscape will utilize existing digital platforms or forms of communicating to transfer their values to elevate brand ethos in order to raise awareness.

With a greater focus on environmental, tech, and social platforms as areas of growth — your child will find their feet in promising and ever-changing industries. In order to accommodate a changing landscape, an all-rounded education that encourages an inquisitive mindset will allow them to spot challenges and tackle them. Find out more about how CoCoon Foundation aims to bring the real world into the classroom early: https://foundation.hkcocoon.org/