‘Robots could cause glut of manufactured goods’

BANGKOK: Dhanin Chearavanont, the chairman and chief executive of the Charoen Pokphand Group, stressed that the future era would be driven by robots and lead to a surplus of manufactured goods.

The upcoming robotics era will end inflation and create a dangerous supply glut in manufactured goods, according to Dhanin Chearavanont, chairman and chief executive of the Charoen Pokphand (CP) Group.

During his keynote speech at the Nikkei Asia300 Global Business Forum here yesterday, the 77-yearold boss of the US$41bil (RM170.19bil) Thai conglomerate shared his vision about the future, including his beliefs that humans will be able to “fly” and live for 200 years, while autonomous and electric vehicles will become a reality.

“With today’s technology, tens or hundreds of times more goods will be manufactured than humans (can produce).

“I’m worried that there will be an oversupply of goods.

“It’s dangerous because robots can work 24 hours (a day), without having to pause.

“We have to think about how we’re going to deal with growing unemployment, as people will be working only three days (a week) since (with technology) they can work from anywhere,” he pointed out.

He said the robotics age would allow firms, including CP, which had established “no-human” factories in Europe, to invest anywhere in the world, without constraints, such as workers’ rights and labour unions.

“Since there are no more unions, we will produce goods in the (global) markets and bring them back for sale in Asia,” the CP chief said.

Dhanin foresees viable opportunities for the service industry, where robots could be used to aid the elderly citizens.

CP is adjusting to produce food products for elderly consumers, he revealed.

“(Elderly care) is a great business. CP just sent our people to study (it), especially at Itochu in Japan, where they have robots to help elderly people to live happily,” he noted.

Dhanin said the “Industry 4.0” era would present a great opportunity for Asean countries, especially Thailand, where Prime Minister Prayut Chan-o-cha was embarking on new legislation, investment incentives and various infrastructure to attract talent, biotech, robotics, software and next generation automobile industries in the Eastern Economic Corridor area.

He said CP was looking to benefit from information sharing between the partners from its recent acquisition of Citic, which it jointly took over with Itochu last year, as well as its acquisition of Ping An Insurance. — The Nation/Asia News Network