The Gauteng launch of the 2009 State of the Future report was held at a cocktail gathering on 10 December 2009 at 18:00. The event was held at the Executive Dining Room, Donald Gordon Building, University of Witwatersrand Parktown campus. Co-hosted by the Wits Graduate School of Public and Development Management  (P&DM) and the SA Node of the Millennium Project, the event included presentations by Prof. Daniel Plaatjies (Director and Head of P&DM), Koffi Kouakou (Senior Lecturer at P&DM), and directors of the SA Node JP Landman and Geci Karuri-Sebina.

Global Climate Change Situation Room launched. A major new initiative of the Millennium Project is to create a collective intelligence for the Global Climate Change Situation Room in Gimcheon, South Korea initiated by the Millennium Project Node in South Korea. It will be available to the public via the Internet.  For more information, see the Fact Sheet - http://millennium-project.org/millennium/new.html and invitation to experts to participate in the collective intelligence system of the Global Climate Change Situation Room - http://millennium-project.org/millennium/Invitation_Letter.doc .

2009 Tech Awards webcast. As you may know, The Millennium Project helped inspire the creation of the Tech Awards and encourages people around the world to nominate innovators. If you were ever curious to see the ceremony, you can see it live this year.  It will be webcast live on Thursday night, November 19th 2009 at: http://bit.ly/techawards2009nbcbayarea. There’s a simple welcome page at this site now, but it will come to life starting at 7:00 p.m. US Pacific Standard Time on Thursday the 19th. The emcee of the Gala will be Becky Quick, co-host of the CNBC program “Squawk Box”.  Highlights will include videos of and introductions to all 15 of this year’s Laureates, interviews with two former Laureates who will give us an update on their work in India and Brazil, and a presentation by Global Humanitarian Award recipient, Al Gore.

A Western Cape launch of the 2009 State of the Future report is being held at a cocktail gathering on Thursday 12 November 2009 from 17:30 – 18:30 at the Lord Charles Hotel in Somerset West. The event is co-sponsored by the SA Node and the Institute for Futures Research, with support from the Lord Charles Hotel. The invitation includes recorded messages from MP Director and SA Node Chair.

An announcement will follow regarding a Gauteng region launch of the Report.

Foresight for Smart Globalization: Accelerating & Enhancing Pro-Poor Development Opportunities report released.  This report advocates “pro-poor foresight” which challenges the futures/foresight community to build into foresight analysis consideration of the impacts of policies on the poor as well as the opportunities for eliminating poverty. The report argues that: Foresight, as generally applied within government, industry, and the non-governmental sector, rarely includes an explicit focus on poverty.  While foresight exercises typically take into account the impact of long-term political, economic, social, and technological trends, the differential implications of these factors for the lives of the poor tend not to be addressed.  The poor, however, will be disproportionately affected by the myriad and intractable problems of the 21st century, including climate change disasters, weak governance systems, financial crises, security threats, and societal disruptions.

The report is a synthesis of findings and discussions from an international panel of experts that was convened by the Rockefeller Foundation (and facilitated by the Institute for Alternative Futures) in May in Bellagio, Italy to discuss this topic. Two directors from the SA Node participated in the panel. The SA Node’s foresightfordevelopment.org initiative is a spin-off of this landmark initiative.

Global Millennium Prize Competition South Africa launched. This pilot of the global GMP competition is being undertaken by the SA Node with the support of the  Cooperation Framework on Innovation Systems between Finland and South (COFISA) which is sponsoring the pilot. The competition is being held in South Africa’s Free State province with Grade 10 learners in 10 selected schools in the Kroonstad area. Local winners will be entered into the international competition possibly winning an expense-paid trip to participate in the international GMP winners’ ceremony in Mexico City in May 2010.

If successful, the Node intends to seek ways to roll out the GMP as an annual competition for SA schools. Support is invited towards this.

2009 State of the Future released to the usual acclaim. State of the Future 2009 presents an in-depth analysis that underlines the need of national policies with great global impact.- Alonso Lujambio, Minister of Education, Mexico;  The 2009 State of the Future updates humanity’s thinking about the future and includes insights and collective intelligence that policymakers and business leaders can use to inform their decisionmaking to create a sustainable and better future.- Michael Stoneking, Partner, Deloitte & Touche LLP

The report is available locally from the SA Node.

SA Node at 2009 MP-PC and WFS. SA Node chairperson (Geci Karuri-Sebina) and director (Tanja Hichert) participated and presented in Millennium Project Planning Committee meeting in Chicago. The SA Node also sat on the World Future Society Conference‘s International Panel on “Futurists Views from Around the World”

Leaders of the SA Node were invited to participate in the Africa session of the World Economic Forum’s Future of Mining and Metals global scenario planning initiative. This is the second time that the Node has participated in WEF’s scenario activities. In 2008, the Node participated in WEF’s Futures Thinking and Practices in Africa - Practitioners’ Review.

Futures Research Methods Version 3.0 CD released. Futures Research Methodology Version 3.0 is the largest, most comprehensive collection of internationally peer-reviewed handbook on methods and tools to explore future possibilities ever assembled in one resource. The CD-ROM contains 39 chapters totaling about 1,300 pages. The SA Node participated in the peer review of the CD.

The CD is available locally from the SA Node.