Canada's future workforce needs to adjust to new disruptive technologies and the impact of climate change, says Laurentian University biology professor Charles Ramcharan.
Ramcharan, who was the keynote speaker at the Sudbury and Manitoulin Workforce Planning annual general meeting Thursday, said robotics have already replaced a number of manufacturing jobs in Canada and around the world.
“If you have a job where you're highly paid, and the task you're doing is somewhat repetitive, you're in trouble,” he said.
The jobs most likely to stay relevant are those that are highly skilled – such as computer programming – or low-paying service jobs – working in retail or as a waiter at a restaurant, for example – that cannot yet be done by machines.
With the threat climate change poses, Ramcharan said the green economy shows the greatest promise for attractive job prospects in the coming years.
As droughts and floods reduce the Earth's arable landmass, Ramcharan said researchers will need to develop new ways to feed the world's growing population.
As sea levels rise due to the melting ice caps, many of the world's largest urban centres – including London, New York, Shanghai and Hong Kong could be underwater.
In Canada, Ramcharan said Vancouver and St. John's could also be impacted by the rising sea level.
“These are huge areas with gigantic populations, and we're going to have to be moving these people,” he said.
The task of rebuilding these large cities will also create a lot of jobs, Ramcharan said.
But many of his students, he said, do not have the skills they will need to prosper in the new economy.
“They focus so much on their grades, and that's important, of course, but the other thing is they have to think about how they're interacting with other people,” he said. “The last time they will ever have to work as an individual is their last day at university.”
Ramcharan said universities need to change the way they prepare students for the realities of the workforce, and part of that would be encouraging more teamwork.
While Ramcharan said climate change will have a destructive impact, he said he remains an optimist.
“I'm scared of the challenges we face, but I'm an optimist that we can deal with it,” he said.
