FIDIC’s Future Leaders Advisory Council (FLAC) is inviting submissions of papers for the 2025 edition of its annual FIDIC Future Leaders Booklet. The booklet, now in its ninth edition, will be launched at the 2025 annual FIDIC Global Infrastructure Conference in Cape Town in September where the theme will be Smart Infrastructure: Equality, Resilience and Innovation for a Sustainable World. 

This year’s booklet theme is Investing now for a better future and papers are invited according to the following sub-themes.

• Sustainability and resilience (Net zero, decarbonisation, nature-based solutions, building resilient infrastructure).
• Social sustainability (Diversity, equity and inclusion, fair wages, mentoring, etc.).
• Investing to prevent unethical behaviours in projects i.e. The ‘darker side of projects’ (Modern slavery, corruption, unsustainable exploitation of resources, etc.).
• Digital revolution (Digital transformation, artificial intelligence (AI), augmented reality (AR), robotics, etc.).
• Other (please specify).

Infrastructure investment plays a pivotal role in driving economic growth, fostering development and enhancing the quality of life of the communities all around the world. By laying the groundwork for sustained economic prosperity, robust infrastructure is crucial for ensuring social inclusion and equitable access to essential services like clean water, electricity and healthcare facilities to underserved communities. In the face of the big challenges that the world is currently experiencing, such as rapid urbanisation, climate change and disruption of new technologies to mention a few, this year’s FIDIC Future Leaders Booklet aims to shine a light on how best to transform lives by investing and building a better world for all.

In 2024, FIDIC had so many successful submissions for the Future Leaders Booklet that it launched three booklets around sustainability, the construction sector and technology (pictured above). The booklet aims to highlight the importance of good, sustainable, ethical and efficient infrastructure investment in improving and enhancing both the global environment that we all depend on and the living standards and economic prospects of citizens around the world. It also provides a great level of exposure and publicity for published authors. 

Submissions are encouraged that discuss and highlight the important role that future leaders play in shaping the future of the infrastructure industry and which demonstrate how current trends are shaping the future world we will live in. Future Leaders from around the world are invited to share their thoughts, experiences and ideas in this unique and exciting publication.

All authors must be a Future Leader (under 40 years of age at the date of publication of the booklet – 21 September 2025) and satisfy at least one of the membership criteria which is to (1) be a member of FIDIC’s Future Leaders council; (2) Be a member of a FIDIC Regional Future Leaders group; (3) Be a member of a FIDIC member association Future Leaders group or (4) Be an employee of a member firm affiliated to a FIDIC member association.
All submissions must be made in English via the FIDIC website and be entered by the deadline date of 27 June 2025.

Click here for full details of how to submit a paper for the 2025 FIDIC Future Leaders Booklet.