Every year on International Literacy Day (September 8), the world marks the importance of reading and writing – two fundamental human rights and the keys to global citizenship. But today, traditional concepts of literacy are evolving. It’s less about letters on a page and more about being plugged into technology.
What does this mean for societies? And, what does it mean for the youth?
AI is already disrupting the way we live and work, and the youth will inherit a future where almost every profession is influenced by the technology. It’s likely that students who collected their A-Level results last month will in 10 years be working jobs that don’t even exist yet.
In fact, the World Economic Forum’s Future Jobs Report 2025 forecasts that AI and data processing will create 11 million new roles by 2030 alone. Unsurprisingly, the report suggests technological skills will grow in importance faster than any others in the next five years, with AI at the top of the list.
Despite this data, nearly half of today’s students say they do not feel prepared for an AI-enabled workplace. Addressing this gap is a regional imperative for the Gulf.
AI literacy along with agility, resilience, and humility, represent an extremely competitive skillset
Here, more than half of the population is under 30 – a significant demographic dividend if countries can fully prepare their youth for an AI-enabled future.
Fortunately, GCC governments have already recognised this and are ahead of the game. The UAE, Saudi Arabia and Kuwait have all committed to embedding AI into their national curricula with many schools now even teaching AI to four-year-olds.
Youth skilling programmes are also being conducted outside schools. Two region-wide examples are the One Million Prompters initiative and the earlier One Million Arab Coders programme, launched in 2017 to develop digital literacy among Arab youth. Far from being knee-jerk responses to new digital trends, these programmes are born from long-term national strategies. Ultimately, they signal that AI literacy is now viewed by leaders as a building block of national progress.
And it is not just policymakers and academia working to close the skills gap. The private sector, which relies entirely on quality talent pipelines, is helping to lead the effort.
For example, major businesses have joined non-profits like Education for Employment to teach young people to use AI for the workplace. Importantly, these efforts are designed to ensure equity in AI literacy so that everyone, regardless of their background, gender, or ability, has the chance to become fluent in this new language of opportunity.
Aside from government, academia, businesses and non-profits, there is one more group responsible for ensuring the next generation of workers is AI-literate – and that’s young people themselves.
Youth have the biggest stake in the future and have the most to gain by embracing AI. The Middle East region could add $232 billion to its gross domestic product by 2035 if AI is harnessed effectively. By 2050, that number could be significantly higher.
To capture this opportunity, young people must be supported to gain technical proficiency in areas like prompt engineering, programming, data and machine learning. But crucially, this should not come at the expense of basic human skills like critical thinking, ethical reasoning, creativity and empathy.
Together, AI literacy along with agility, resilience and humility represent an extremely competitive skillset. I believe this comprehensive approach to proficiency is vital to not only help young people stand out in the workplace of tomorrow, but also to build the economies of the future.
International Literacy Day reminds us that literacy has always been the gateway to opportunity. A century ago, teaching a child to read and write was one of the most powerful investments a society could make. In the future, society must continue to value the basic skills that allow humans to communicate with one another.
Because while AI fluency may determine who writes the code, the future will be written by those who can combine tech know-how with age-old human attributes – communicating, understanding and innovating.
Will the pound fall to parity with the dollar?
The idea of pound parity now seems less far-fetched as the risk grows that Britain may split away from the European Union without a deal.
Rupert Harrison, a fund manager at BlackRock, sees the risk of it falling to trade level with the dollar on a no-deal Brexit. The view echoes Morgan Stanley’s recent forecast that the currency can plunge toward $1 (Dh3.67) on such an outcome. That isn’t the majority view yet – a Bloomberg survey this month estimated the pound will slide to $1.10 should the UK exit the bloc without an agreement.
New Prime Minister Boris Johnson has repeatedly said that Britain will leave the EU on the October 31 deadline with or without an agreement, fuelling concern the nation is headed for a disorderly departure and fanning pessimism toward the pound. Sterling has fallen more than 7 per cent in the past three months, the worst performance among major developed-market currencies.
“The pound is at a much lower level now but I still think a no-deal exit would lead to significant volatility and we could be testing parity on a really bad outcome,” said Mr Harrison, who manages more than $10 billion in assets at BlackRock. “We will see this game of chicken continue through August and that’s likely negative for sterling,” he said about the deadlocked Brexit talks.
The pound fell 0.8 per cent to $1.2033 on Friday, its weakest closing level since the 1980s, after a report on the second quarter showed the UK economy shrank for the first time in six years. The data means it is likely the Bank of England will cut interest rates, according to Mizuho Bank.
The BOE said in November that the currency could fall even below $1 in an analysis on possible worst-case Brexit scenarios. Options-based calculations showed around a 6.4 per cent chance of pound-dollar parity in the next one year, markedly higher than 0.2 per cent in early March when prospects of a no-deal outcome were seemingly off the table.
Bloomberg
Conflict, drought, famine
Estimates of the number of deaths caused by the famine range from 400,000 to 1 million, according to a document prepared for the UK House of Lords in 2024.
It has been claimed that the policies of the Ethiopian government, which took control after deposing Emperor Haile Selassie in a military-led revolution in 1974, contributed to the scale of the famine.
Dr Miriam Bradley, senior lecturer in humanitarian studies at the University of Manchester, has argued that, by the early 1980s, “several government policies combined to cause, rather than prevent, a famine which lasted from 1983 to 1985. Mengistu’s government imposed Stalinist-model agricultural policies involving forced collectivisation and villagisation [relocation of communities into planned villages].
The West became aware of the catastrophe through a series of BBC News reports by journalist Michael Buerk in October 1984 describing a “biblical famine” and containing graphic images of thousands of people, including children, facing starvation.
Band Aid
Bob Geldof, singer with the Irish rock group The Boomtown Rats, formed Band Aid in response to the horrific images shown in the news broadcasts.
With Midge Ure of the band Ultravox, he wrote the hit charity single Do They Know it’s Christmas in December 1984, featuring a string of high-profile musicians.
Following the single’s success, the idea to stage a rock concert evolved.
Live Aid was a series of simultaneous concerts that took place at Wembley Stadium in London, John F Kennedy Stadium in Philadelphia, the US, and at various other venues across the world.
The combined event was broadcast to an estimated worldwide audience of 1.5 billion.
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Whole-of-life insurance: as its name suggests, this type of life cover is designed to run for the rest of your life. You pay regular monthly premiums and in return, get a guaranteed cash lump sum whenever you die. As a result, premiums are typically much higher than one term life insurance, although they do not usually increase with age. In some cases, you have to keep up premiums for as long as you live, although there may be a cut-off period, say, at age 80 but it can go as high as 95. There are penalties if you don’t last the course and you may get a lot less than you paid in.
Critical illness cover: this pays a cash lump sum if you suffer from a serious illness such as cancer, heart disease or stroke. Some policies cover as many as 50 different illnesses, although cancer triggers by far the most claims. The payout is designed to cover major financial responsibilities such as a mortgage or children’s education fees if you fall ill and are unable to work. It is cost effective to combine it with life insurance, with the policy paying out once if you either die or suffer a serious illness.
Income protection: this pays a replacement income if you fall ill and are unable to continue working. On the best policies, this will continue either until you recover, or reach retirement age. Unlike critical illness cover, policies will typically pay out for stress and musculoskeletal problems such as back trouble.
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UAE currency: the story behind the money in your pockets
