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As aviation becomes increasingly accessible in all parts of the world, future Journeys will increasingly be made by air particularly to and from emerging markets. According to Airbus’ latest Global Market Forecast (GMF) in the next 20 years (2013-2032), air traffic will grow at 4.7 per cent annually requiring over 29,220 new passenger and freighter aircraft valued at nearly US$4.4 trillion. Some 28,350 of these are passenger aircraft valued at US$4.1 trillion. Of these, some 10,400 will replace existing aircraft with more efficient ones. With today’s fleet of 17,740 aircraft, it means that by 2032, the worldwide fleet will double to nearly 36,560 aircraft. Economic growth, growing middle classes, affordability, ease of travel, urbanisation, tourism, and migration are some factors increasing connectivity between people and regions and how often they travel. Increasing urbanisation will lead to a doubling of mega cities from 42 today to 89 by 2032, and 99 per cent of the world’s long-haul traffic will be between or through these.

However, the focal point of the urbanisation boom is China, which has an estimated 65m vacant properties. Their construction coincides with the “greatest level of bank lending in the history of the world”, says Bill Rhodes, the veteran Citi banker. In 2009, total Chinese credit expanded by almost half of gross domestic product. In 2010, it repeated this feat.

So what has made this outbreak so big? The overriding factor could be urbanisation. In the past, village outbreaks remained small, unless people went to hospitals. "Population size and high mobility make it hard to do contact tracing," says Peter Walsh at the University of Cambridge. Cities provide more chances to spread the virus, something that may also have enabled the spread of HIV. According to the African Development Bank, the continent has had the world's highest urban growth rate for 20 years, and the proportion of Africans living in cities will rise from 36 per cent to 60 per cent by 2050.

In much the same way, China's urbanisation will continue to unfold in the major centres where the jobs are. Today, only about 15 per cent of China's population lives in its top three urban regions: the Yangtze River Delta, Pearl River Delta and greater Beijing

Daimler and BMW – and, to a lesser extent, Volkswagen, Nissan, Renault and Ford – are already ahead of the game in recognising that it will now be sustainable for increasing numbers of single occupancy cars to pour into already congested cities on a daily basis as they do now. BMW's alternative powertrain sub-brand, i – due to be launched later this year – addresses this with a full suite of mobility options, and while Daimler has not formed a separate division in which to wrap the work it is doing, it is starting to move well beyond the traditional role of car manufacturer andretailer.

To sustain the economic growth momentum in cities, supply of reliable and stable power is critical. The way electricity is produced, stored, managed, and applied is likely to undergo several challenges due to technological advancements, changing demand patterns, and consumers' awareness level

Three types of risk The expert group put together by the Commission has already identified three types of risks: Import risk, where raw materials are imported from a politically instable region or from a country where the market economy does not work. "That is relatively easy to do as the World Bank has put together governance indexes which measure the political and economic stability index of countries," the EU official explained.    Production risk within the EU, with potential problems such as land access. "If we are in a country for example where the population density is very high, where urbanisation is very high, obviously access will be weak," the EU official explained. Environmental risk, based on indicators such as air or soil pollution, where the impact of raw materials use is measured from an environmental point of view. "This is innovative compared to other studies," the EU official said. "We have just launched a life-cycle analysis to determine what the environmental impact is for each raw material in terms of exploitation, use, treatment, recycling etc., for air or soil pollution as well as emissions of greenhouse gases."