How can we create $12 trillion a year in market opportunities by 2030? How about by meeting the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals? The goals, a set of 17 stretch goals and 169 related targets championed by the United Nations, are ambitious. But a recent report concludes that meeting the goals in just four out of 60 sectors (food and agriculture, cities, energy and materials, and health and wellbeing) could indeed open up market opportunities worth up to $12 trillion a year in less than 15 years.
Saving the Planet from Ecological Disaster Is a $12 Trillion Opportunity
To address the realities of climate change and the ways in which we are increasingly overrunning planetary boundaries, we must shift our mindsets, technologies, and business models away from incremental thinking. We urgently need to find real breakthroughs — the kinds of things that will have 100x impact on a billion or more people. Doing so means shifting our mindsets from linear thinking to exponential thinking; chasing technologies that will help us overcome resource constraints and create a world of abundance; and finding business models that are more social, lean, integrated, and circular. According to UN estimates, if we can meet key stretch goals in just four areas — food and agriculture, cities, energy and materials, and health and wellbeing — we could open up market opportunities worth up to $12 trillion a year in less than 15 years.