With 2025, a new generation emerges—the Generation Beta. Gen Beta defines the demographic cohort who are born from 2025 to 2039. Some of the Gen Beta will live to see the 22nd century. But what they’ll see is a puzzle.
In an exponentially evolving world, it is challenging to predict what the future holds for the children of tomorrow. While obscure scenarios caused by conflicts, climate disasters, and unresolved poverty exist, advancements in technology and science offer a beacon of hope for optimistic solutions.
The United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) published “The State of the World’s Children.” The report is dedicated to answering the question, “What will the world look like for children in 2050?” UNICEF first worked on a similar report in 1980, and the question was aimed at 2000. In just 25 years, the world has changed so much that the predictions for the year 2000 wouldn’t be accurate.
The report’s findings show that according to the current trajectory, in many high-income countries children will account for a smaller share of the population. By 2100, there will be more children on the African continent than anywhere else in the world.
What lies ahead for the children of tomorrow, and what trends are shaping their futures? Can today’s adults alter the trajectory for these children? UNICEF is working on a blueprint for a brighter future.
What about the children of today?
Before projecting the future, it’s crucial to understand the world children are living in today. From Gaza to Sudan millions of children are growing up in conflict zones. Climate disasters hit almost every country in the world with extreme temperatures, floods, and wildfires. UNICEF estimates that in recent years, the equivalent of about 20,000 children a day worldwide have been displaced by floods and storms exacerbated by climate change. Extreme poverty has become a chronic problem in Somalia, Chad, and many other countries. Wars and disasters are causing the rise of international immigration while the far right all around the world intensifies discrimination for millions of immigrants, threatening their lives.
Growth in number of children in urban settings in the business-as-usual scenario, from the 2000s to the 2050s, by region
Do we have to be all pessimistic? Science and technology give us plenty of reasons not to be. According to UNICEF, under-5 mortality has dropped 60 percent in the past 30 years and malnutrition has decreased by 45 percent. And, rising vaccination coverage has saved countless lives all around the world.
Trends that are shaping tomorrow
UNICEF focuses on three megatrends that will shape the future for the children of 2050: Demographic transition, climate and environmental crises, and frontier technologies. These three trends are already changing today and will have much stronger effects in the future. Drawing on these three megatrends and other socioeconomic indicators UNICEF commissioned the Wittgenstein Centre for Demography and Global Human Capital to analyze scenarios using the Shared Socioeconomic Pathways (SSPs) model to explore how the world might look for children in 2050. “The future is now,” UNICEF emphasizes to underline that each megatrend is shaped by what steps humanity is taking today. First, let’s take a look at the three megatrends to better understand each scenario.
The plateauing graphic
According to the findings of UNICEF, the number of children worldwide is plateauing. Even though people live longer thanks to the development of science and technology, they are having fewer children. This pattern varies in every country in its causes and intensity but, the underlying trend remains consistent.
To analyze the demographic transition, the United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs considers three factors: mortality, fertility, and international migration. According to the department’s analysis, in the 2050s, the number of children under the age 18 in the world is predicted to be roughly the same as today: about 2.3 billion. Meanwhile the adult population will continue to grow. Current global birthrates indicate a population that is getting older. According to the report, by the 2050’s more than a third of the world’s children will live in China, India, Nigeria, and Pakistan. Half of the world’s children will live in only 10 countries.
The figure above shows patterns of growth in adult and children populations from 2000’s to 2050’s. If the world continues the same trends, it’s visible that the number of children will plateau.
Man-made disaster: Climate crisis
The world is already facing the dire consequences of the climate crisis in 2025. Climate scientists announced that the Earth’s average temperature climbed to more than 1.5°C above pre-industrial levels for the first time in 2024. UNICEF underlines that there is a triple environmental problem with climate crisis, pollution and biodiversity loss. Each of these factors will continue to affect children’s overall health and will cause a global displacement.
How to manage the rapid advancements in technology?
While digitalization is reshaping modern life, from work and education to healthcare and energy, technology alone isn’t capable of building a better world for children. Governments and international agencies must design policies to protect children’s lives in the fast paced digital world. Access to digital tools has become a critical determinant of opportunity. According to the UNICEF report, in Europe, approximately 90% of jobs now require basic digital skills alongside traditional literacy and numeracy. By 2030, over 230 million jobs in sub-Saharan Africa will demand such skills. Yet, today there is a digital divide affecting young people in low and middle income countries. While over 95% of individuals in high-income nations are connected to the internet, this figure plummets to just 26% in low-income countries. For example in Africa, where 63% of people own mobile phones but only 37% use the internet, connectivity is limited by unreliable electricity, inadequate infrastructure, and restrictive policies.
What are the benefits?
Frontier technologies have their undeniable benefits with the advancements in artificial intelligence and neurotechnologies. Even the developments in vaccine science prove that many deaths are and will be avoidable. However UNICEF warns that governments and agencies should focus on creating ethical, inclusive, and child-sensitive frameworks to guide digital innovation.
Which way to go?
According to UNICEF, there are different paths for humanity to go: business-as-usual, accelerated development and delayed development. In the business-as-usual scenario, historical patterns continue unchanged. Projections show a surge in child populations in low- and lower-middle income countries, with declines elsewhere. Extreme heatwaves could expose eight times more children than in the 2000s, while universal secondary education remains an unfulfilled goal. Furthermore, prolonged subnational conflicts in parts of Africa could affect more children than in the past.
The accelerated development scenario envisions rapid progress driven by strong social investments and sustainable practices. In the future, newborn life expectancy could soar from 68 to 84 years. Economic growth, paired with social protections, may reduce child poverty, while universal education and gender equality become achievable milestones. The number of children exposed to conflict could drop by nearly 60%, offering hope for a more equitable world. The delayed development scenario paints a grim picture of fragmented progress. By the 2050s, nearly 14 times more children could face extreme heatwaves compared to the 2000s. Millions might still lack access to quality education, with 1.1 billion children living in gender-unequal societies. Alarmingly, up to 1.4 billion children could be at risk of prolonged conflicts.
The State of the World’s Children report draws a picture of 2050, reminding us that every moment is an opportunity to build a brighter future for children.
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