CEO looks into future

Otago Regional Council chief executive Peter Bodeker recently spent a week attending a course at Melbourne University, focusing on ''futures thinking'' and strategic development.

Futures thinking was ''not for the faint-hearted'' and did require a ''leap of faith'' as to what technologies would be possible within a generation or two, Mr Bodeker said in a council report, discussed yesterday.

Driverless cars, genetic technologies for pest control, and nanotechnology for human health were examples relevant to Otago.

A strategic planning exercise in July could include a futures thinking approach, he said.