The Science and technology of growing young, by Sergey Young, where he explores the world of innovation and disruption in the medical field. Sergey is a venture capitalist who invests in disruptive innovation happening in health Management and Longevity.

This piqued curiosity with statements such as “Imagine living a productive life up to the age of 150 years and looking like a 26-year-old; that your body will go through a repair process every night with the nanobots that are in your bloodstream, and Internet of Body (IoB) where your profile and persona will be downloaded. In this future world, when you pass away, your persona can be recreated from the IoB and those close to you will be able to interface with a virtual version of yourself.” This sounds crazy, right? However, there are huge investments in companies that are exploring these possibilities to make them a reality.

This experience motivated Mohammed Mukadam, a Stellenbosch Business School Alumnus, to apply to local Cape Town community radio station, Radio 786. The aim, to start up a programme to discuss what emerging trends are on the horizon that will fundamentally change our lives in the future. This programme was to become “Al Mustaqbal”. Futures studies is a field of social inquiry with the core purpose being the systematic study of the future.

We are already immersed in the fourth industrial Revolution (4IR) and awareness of how it is affecting us in a broader sense will be expanded on and linked to topics relating to the future. The intention of the programme was that the listeners and the youth, in particular, can be introduced to these futures thinking topics which will empower them to think more systemically and engage more actively in shaping their future.

Listeners were introduced to the field and how future studies are used to anticipate and influence the future in a world of rapidly accelerating change.

Abbas Jamie, Stellenbosch Business School Futures Studies Alumnus, and Mohammed commenced with this programme at the beginning of 2022, covering various topics such as the Future of Learning, Robotics, Cybersecurity, The Future of Money.

Following Abbas’ move to Lombok, Mohammed was privileged and honoured to partner with the Institute for Future Research (IFR) at the Stellenbosch Business School. Prof Andre Roux kindly agreed to join as the co-host of the programme. The series has been growing with listeners participating in providing their questions and insights into the different topics that we covered.

Thanks to a sponsorship by the IFR, Al Mustaqbal has also been able to send the first cohort of youth who attended one of the IFR’s Futures Methods We look forward to continuing this programme in 2023 focusing strongly on the key objective of ensuring that we enlighten the youth through debate, discussion and training.

Currently, the planning of the programme’s 2023 calendar will also include face-to-face events to ensure that we deliver on our promise allowing our listeners to truly “Imagine a better future”. We will also be reaching out to other institutes of research and companies to contribute to the diversity of our programme. If you would like to participate in Al Mustaqbal, please contact Mohamed Mukadam or the Institute for Futures Research. Al Mustaqbal is broadcasted on Radio 786 every alternate Wednesday between 7pm and 8pm.