as soon as you start thinking about how
our stuff will move in 30 years time
there are two critical questions will as
much stuff be travelling us today and
we're literally going as far over the
last three decades shipping and
logistics companies have built vast
ports in Far East
they've been served by ever bigger ships
to handle the millions of containers
that move goods from China and Asia to
the rest of the world that process may
reverse by 2050 the pay gap between the
rich world and China will matter and
robotics will reduce the importance of
cheap labor in response manufacturing is
likely to reassure the market in Western
Europe it will possibly move to Eastern
Europe Mexico could become the
manufacturing hub for North America more
physical products might also go the way
of CDs or DVDs and be delivered
invisibly than fiber-optic cables rather
than traveling in boxes books are
already moving in that direction these
trends could make vast ships less useful
and push shipping lines back towards
smaller ships that are quicker to load
and unload energy costs are set to go up
ships don't use much energy compared
with trucks for example so water
transport is likely to remain attractive
and when things can't go by water
energy-efficient rail is likely to take
more of the market share of road
transport some container terminals
already look futuristic autonomous
vehicles zip metal boxes to and from the
key side but in the future increased
computing power should help trains to
low
and unload ships still faster that will
make ports smarter and more efficient
hubs in a cleaner more intelligent goods
transport system