25/08/2026
FUTURE-READY GILGIT-BALTISTAN
Written by : Izhar Hunzai
A child entering school in Gilgit-Baltistan today may still be working in 2080. Yet much of our education and career advice continues to prepare young people for the economy and occupations of the past. Future readiness requires us to reverse this logic: first imagine the economy our young people are likely to enter, then work backwards to identify the skills, attitudes and adaptive capacities they need today.
The emerging economy will increasingly be shaped by artificial intelligence, automation, robotics, renewable energy, biotechnology, digital finance and globally connected work. AI will perform a growing share of routine cognitive tasks, while machines will increasingly perform physical ones. Geography will matter differently. A talented young person in Hunza, Ghizer, Diamer or Baltistan will increasingly be able to create value for people thousands of kilometres away without permanently leaving home. Our mountains need not remain barriers; connectivity can turn them into a distinctive location from which to participate in the global knowledge economy.
This does not mean everybody must become a programmer. As machines become better at calculating, searching, translating, analysing and generating, distinctly human capabilities may become even more valuable: curiosity, judgement, imagination, communication, empathy, leadership, ethical reasoning, collaboration and the ability to ask powerful questions. Knowing remains important, but the capacity to learn, unlearn and relearn will become indispensable.
We should therefore work backwards:
Future Economy → Future Work → Future Capabilities → Education Today
Future-ready young people in GB should combine global competence with local rootedness: AI literacy and digital fluency, data and financial literacy, entrepreneurship, communication and collaboration, alongside an understanding of our mountains, water, ecology, communities, languages and cultural inheritance. The objective is not merely a collection of technical skills but adaptive capacity—the ability to confront unfamiliar situations, learn rapidly, connect knowledge across fields, experiment, recover from failure and change direction when circumstances change.
We cannot predict precisely what the economy of 2040 or 2050 will look like. But unpredictability does not mean helplessness. The future is better understood as a field of possibilities. Some futures are more probable than others, and our choices today can change those probabilities. Education, technology, entrepreneurship, creativity, institutions and civic action are not merely preparations for the future; they are instruments for creating it.
This requires a change of mindset: from job-seeking to value-creation; credentials to capabilities; memorisation to inquiry; fear of failure to experimentation; disciplinary silos to connecting ideas; consuming technology to creating with it; and seeing remoteness as destiny to recognising uniqueness as an advantage.
For our educators, policymakers, entrepreneurs and thought leaders, therefore, the question should no longer be only, “How do we create jobs for our youth?” A much deeper question is:
What kind of human beings will flourish in the emerging world—and what must we start doing in Gilgit-Baltistan today to develop them?
Future-Ready GB is not about predicting one future. It is about giving a generation the skills, attitudes, imagination and adaptive capacity to navigate many possible futures—and the agency to create the one they want.
The writer is Ex-RPM of AKRSP, social and political leader of Gilgit-Baltistan.
