Project 8 Seeks to Anticipate the Needs of 8 Billion People and Beyond
By Nic Covey, Executive Director, Project 8
Preparing for our civilization’s future is more challenging than ever given accelerating demands on the planet’s resources. Consider that between now and 2030 we expect that worldwide population will increase from 7 billion to over 8 billion people, life expectancies will continue to rise, over 500 million people will move into cities and over 1.5 billion people will join the middle class. What will it take to sustain a global population of 8 billion people?
For example:
- How much energy will be needed in India?
- How much new housing will be needed in Brazil?
- How much food will China need to feed its population?
Those charged with planning for the world’s future must first understand future human need. Across both immediate aid programs and longer-term sustainable development solutions, our ability to close critical gaps rests in part on our collective ability to put high-quality metrics into the hands of the decision-makers, whether they be leaders in government agencies, NGOs, foundations, non-profit agencies, academia or business.
However, today’s knowledge of future human needs is:
- Highly fragmented Many forecasts exist, but they are produced by organizations from many different businesses, governments and think tanks, all operating with different purposes.
- Highly variable Even within a single need in a specific country, there can be a wide variation across estimates. There isn’t an easy way to compare these forecasts, or understand the different scientific assumptions that drive different models.
- Challenging to access and navigate Much of the world’s understanding of future human needs isn’t readily accessible to both public- and private-sector leaders. Alternative future scenarios for any human need category usually remain in discrete silos, unavailable for purposes of comparison.
There is no silver bullet that will close the intelligence gap, nor one group of datasets that can provide all the answers, but together we can do more to create a common understanding of evolving human demand. At The Demand Institute, we are working on just that: collaborating on an open data project focused on data and forecasts related to human need that will aggregate intelligence from many sources and create a digital community, a commons, for those developing and working with human needs forecasts.
Project 8, as we call it, will bring these information assets together into one online community—a “Digital Demand Commons”—that allows experts all over the world both to contribute and to access this essential knowledge and to discuss and drive collaboration around it. By cataloging existing human needs forecasts and methodologies from many sectors in one place for the first time, we hope to create a collaboration platform and a body of knowledge that helps the world prepare to meet the needs of 8 billion people by 2030.
As the world rallies around a shared, Post-2015 Global Development Agenda, the “Sustainable Development Goals,” we believe that the Project 8 Digital Demand Commons will support the planning and implementation of strategies to achieve the Sustainable Development Goals. As part of the broader “Data Revolution,” Project 8 will bring new sources of information, new cloud-based analytical capabilities and new levels of research collaboration to the development community.
Making it real
In 2015, we are building a prototype of the Project 8 Digital Demand Commons.
- We are focused first on food and agriculture as a fundamental human need and a key Sustainable Development Goal
- We’ll invite a limited group of beta users from across the global food security, agriculture and development data fields to bring their data and expertise to the platform and provide feedback on the user experience
- We’ll monitor activity and outcomes, evaluating whether users are creating value for one another and their organizations
- We’ll grow the project as a lean social startup, remaining remain agile, curious and iterative as we tackle a complex and exciting opportunity
Following the 2015 prototype and refinement, we will open the platform up to additional users and incorporate additional categories of human need such as energy, water and housing.
The power of collaboration
Project 8 was founded by the United Nations Office of the Secretary-General, the United Nations Foundation and The Demand Institute (jointly operated by The Conference Board and Nielsen).
The project is guided by a five-member advisory group from the founding organizations:
- Kathy Calvin, CEO of the United Nations Foundation
- Mark Leiter, Chairman of the Demand Institute and Chief Strategy Officer of Nielsen
- Jon Spector, CEO of The Conference Board
- David Calhoun, Executive Chairman of Nielsen
- The Office of the Secretary-General of the United Nations
Project 8 is powered by Salesforce, a leader in cloud analytics, with the generous implementation services of Accenture.
Join Project 8
A cornerstone of the Post-2015 development agenda and the “Data Revolution” is an increased ability to unite public- and private-sector interests to solve the world’s biggest problems. Project 8 embodies that opportunity to bring together the unique knowledge, capabilities and assets of public and private sector organizations. Specifically, the Project 8 team seeks:
- Domain experts with perspectives on future demand for food and agriculture, which is where we are starting our journey
- Foundations, individuals and private sector organizations help scale the project
- Communications organizations to drive engagement with the Digital Demand Commons by users and producers of data from all 193 UN member states
- Related initiatives that could collaborate and coordinate to accelerate progress
Participating organizations will be contributing to a project of enormous importance to planning work across the United Nations system, the public and private sector development community and, consequently, the world.
For more information or to get involved in our work, please get in touch with me (+1 513-394-5003; [email protected]) or Ilze Melngailis (+1 212-907-1318; [email protected]).
About the author:
Nic Covey
Executive Director
Project 8
Nic Covey is a member of The Demand Institute’s senior leadership team and has responsibility for leading all United Nations relationships for both The Demand Institute and Nielsen, worldwide. He is spearheading Project 8: an innovative public-private partnership that will ultimately help governments, NGOs, foundations and the global business community prepare to meet the basic human needs of a planet containing 8 billion people by 2030.
