Manila – ILS Executive Director Ahmma Charisma-Lobrin Satumba tackled the “Future Of Work” during the first UNSW ASEAN Conference last October 12 at the Leighton Hall, John Niland Scientia Building, UNSW in Sydney, Australia.

The conference, organized by UNSW, brought together students, experts and practitioners to immerse in case studies, debates and other mini lectures discuss South East Asia’s key issues. It aimed at combining socio-cultural, political, economic and youth development interests under one roof with Australian and ASEAN youth to empower the youth to discuss, engage in and build on the trans-international exchange of knowledge in the future that is mutually beneficial for all.

Exec. Dir. Satumba was one of the presenters in the Socio-Cultural Pillar session of the conference tackling “Future and Technology” and addressing the question “Will automation kill all the jobs?” Her presentation titled “Future of Work: Scenarios and Implications” focused on the three major drivers of change: Technology, Climate Change, and Demographics. She also gave the participants a primer on the 4th Industrial Revolution and its foreseen impact on the future of work.

In her report, Exec. Director Satumba highlighted that automation will have a big impact on jobs that are clerical and routinary, and other low skilled jobs that are repetitive in nature.

However, she noted that the greatest challenge is still how to nurture all human skills that cannot be replaced by Artificial Intelligence (AI) and automation while creating future jobs with a higher level of competence, and with a greater stability while ensuring social protection mechanisms.