Franz Fayot, Minister of the Economy; Credit: MECO

On Wednesday 14 September 2022, Luxemboourg's Minister of the Economy, Franz Fayot, invited a group of business leaders and Luxembourg Stratégie (Luxembourg Strategy), the strategic foresight department of the Ministry of the Economy, for a first work lunch devoted to the presentation of work on scenarios for possible futures for the Luxembourg economy by 2050.

This strategic foresight work carried out by the Luxembourg Strategy working group under the aegis of a dedicated interministerial committee will continue until 2023. They aim to develop a range of plausible scenarios for the development of Luxembourg by 2050 that will allow to stress-test certain strategic decisions with regard to all the events that could occur in the medium and long term. These different scenarios will then constitute a forward-looking tool making it possible to support strategic decisions with a view to achieving a Luxembourg economy that is both competitive and resilient, i.e. capable of bouncing back from shocks in all scenarios while maintaining its course and transforming itself to become efficient in terms of carbon, materials, energy and surface area.

The first two workshops of the Luxembourg Strategy working group held in June and July enabled the emergence of eight draft scenarios concerning the future of Luxembourg. Luxembourg Strategy then analysed these scenarios in detail in order to avoid any overlap or inconsistency. This analysis made it possible to retain five plausible, distinct and coherent preliminary scenarios.

These five scenarios under construction were submitted for discussion to business leaders during a working lunch in the presence of Minister Fayot. During his welcome speech, Minister Fayot said: “Luxembourg Strategy is a participatory platform which does not dictate the future but which works to foresee all possible futures so as not to suffer them. Thus, even if certain scenarios are neither desirable nor desired, the risks they present are plausible and independent of the strategic choices to be made. All scenarios must therefore be considered in order to cover all eventualities during the transition to a more resilient economy”.

The exercise thus enabled the entrepreneurs to discuss the advantages and disadvantages of each scenario and to adapt and complete the existing drafts with certain missing aspects with regard to their respective activities.

At the same time as this meeting, Luxembourg Strategy also transmitted the progress of the scripting work to its group of experts responsible for checking the consistency and contributing to the refinement of the different scenarios throughout the process.

The scenarios under construction will be presented in their existing state during the annual Luxembourg Strategy public conference to be held at the Maison des arts et des étudiantes de Esch-Belval on 17 and 18 October 2022, in the presence of the Minister Fayot.

They will also be the subject of a public consultation at the end of 2022 aimed at involving all citizens. Before being ratified in March 2023, they will be supplemented by a strategic vision for an economy capable of dealing with all possible alternative futures.

More information is available online via: https://luxstrategie.gouvernement.lu.