ICT industry will play a key role in dealing with problems such as global warming and saving energy. Simply by making processes and systems more efficient savings will start to occur naturally. Furthermore, by giving the end-users more control we will see an increase in energy efficiency.

Once the utilities are able to provide that level of decentralisation – with end-users increasingly taking charge of their own energy management – a large number of energy efficient devices and management tools will flood the market.

These will be eagerly pursued by the users – partly because there is an overwhelming willingness to address the environmental issue we are facing as a community and partly because energy prices are only going to rise, and customers will be looking for products and services that will allow them to maintain the lifestyle they want, within their budget.

While criticism has been leveled at countries such as India and China regarding their enormous use of rapidly depleting (and polluting) fossil energy sources these countries are actually among the biggest investors in alternative energy sources such as solar energy and biofuels. These countries, plus most probably Brazil and perhaps Russia, are going to be key players in this market over the next decade.

Broadband will also be a major contributor in addressing the many problems we are facing as a result of a rather wasteful and inefficient period of global growth. Teleworking should become much better promoted and much better organised. Telehealth and tele-education can (and should) now be delivered worldwide. Many services that previously required hardware products can today be supplied over broadband as software-based applications. Many of the abovementioned energy-saving applications can be delivered and managed via broadband networks.

It is amazing what we can do in this field, once we, as a community, really focus on it. While we still have a massive task ahead of us, 2007 will be seen as the year the pendulum started to swing in the other direction.

With combined human effort now directed towards a much more environmentally friendly world massive changes can be expected over the next five years and beyond, and the ICT industry will take a leadership role in this process.