AI technology will ‘create and eliminate’ jobs in the future

TDT | Manama                                                      

The Daily Tribune – www.newsofbahrain.com

Reported by Julia Cassano

Twenty-three per cent of jobs are expected to change by 2027, according to The World Economic Forum’s Future of Jobs latest 2023 report released yesterday.

According to the estimates of the 803 companies surveyed for the report, employers are now anticipating that 69 million new jobs will be created, however, they also claim that 83 million jobs will be eliminated among the 673 million jobs corresponding to the dataset.

The core of the 2023 Future of Jobs Report is based on a unique survey-based data set covering the expectations of a wide cross-section of the world’s largest employers related to job trends and directions for the 2023-2027 period.

Although many jobs will be eliminated because of AI, many jobs will also be created due to technology adoption. Although technology poses threats to labour markets globally, the report also claims that technology will contribute positively to job creation.

The report states that over 85 per cent of organisations surveyed identify increased adoption of new and frontier technologies and broadening digital access as the trends most likely to drive transformation in their organisation.

Also, the report claims that the largest job creation and destruction affects come from environmental, technology, and economic trends. “The businesses in the report predict the strongest net job-creation effect to be driven by instruments that facilitate the greener transition of businesses, the broader application of ESG standards and supply chains becoming more localised,” The Future of Jobs Report said.

Not only does the report say that technology will contribute positively to job creation, however, Dr Jassim Haji, President of the International Group of Artificial Intelligence, also previously confirmed this to The Daily Tribune.

He said that with more companies and organisations instilling the use of AI into their strategies, there will be smarter and more innovative jobs created in the region. Dr Haji also identified the specific sectors in Bahrain that will be the most affected by the use of AI, including, call centers and customer service as a result of ChatBox and more recently ChatGPT.

Bookkeeping, hospitality services, aviation, training providers replaced by virtual agents, and the banking sector’s routine jobs will be impacted by AI. In all, the key to using AI and technology as an advantage is to train workers to utilise AI and technology to further progress and contribute to their work.

The report says that training workers to utilise AI and big data ranks third among company skills-training priorities in the next five years and will be prioritised by 42 per cent of surveyed companies. On top of this, cognitive skills such as creative thinking and analytical thinking are outlined as the most important skills and are expected to remain this way in the coming years.