"Automate or evaporate": IE meets IFR's Dr Susanne Bieller at GMIS2021

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The future is automated. At least, that’s the direction of traffic and it looks like a one-way street. And while automation is bringing a host of benefits to humanity and manufacturing, there remains scepticism and concerns about the negative impact that the rise of robotics will have, in particular on jobs and wages.

On the sidelines of the Global Manufacturing and Industrialisation Summit 2021, IE spoke to Dr Susanne Bieller, who has served as General Secretary of the International Federation of Robotics (IFR) since May 2019.

The IFR is a global association for the robotics sector whose members include national associations and companies across the robotics supply chain. The IFR offers support and advice to national associations, such as BARA in the UK and VDMA in Germany, who in turn can advise national governments on policy issues.

The manufacturing sector certainly has plenty to gain from the continued adoption and development of robotics; eliminating human error, improving workplace safety and maintaining quality being just a few.

Read more: Cyberselves tech lets humans teleport to robots thousands of miles away

“Robots just make fewer mistakes because they are not like us humans. They can work 24 hours a day, seven days a week, basically, without any errors. That's what they are designed for. So what you get is production with fewer rejects, which is more resource-efficient, and produces less material waste,” explained Dr Bieller.

Nonetheless, despite repeated assurances by industry leaders and automation enthusiasts that automation will lead to job replacement and not job losses, concerns and claims to the contrary simply will not go away. In their 2020 study, ‘Robots and Jobs: Evidence from US Labor Markets’, Daron Acemoglu of MIT and Pascual Restrepo of Boston University claimed that the adoption of automation and robotics could lead to reduced employment and lower wages.

Dr Bieller rejects the study’s premise, however, on the basis that it was conducted using data that is now obsolete. “If you look at that study, you’ll see that the data they're using is quite old and doesn’t really represent the last 10 to 15 years of automation in the US, where they’ve really caught up a lot. What it’s actually looking at are historical times when the uptake of robotics was actually behind what it should have been.

“There’s a comparable study looking at the German labour market, which uses the same methodology and basically the same set of data and it found that robots create jobs. For example, when using robots in a manufacturing setup, an employee would have other tasks to do, replacing those tasks that were automated. It’s not the jobs that are replaced, but the tasks.

“There's always going to be a place for human work somewhere else.”

The argument goes that, within any given job description, there is a number of different tasks to be done. Some of those tasks, the more mundane, difficult, and even dangerous, could be undertaken by robots, which would leave the worker with different, more exciting, more challenging tasks as a result.

“We also see it in the adjacent services industries in which these new jobs are generated. Companies that do not automate do so against their competitors that do. So, the question is not whether or not to automate. To a certain extent, it's more a case of automate or evaporate. It’s necessary to stay competitive.”

Read more: New tricks, smart factories & carbon footprints: IFR's Top 5 Robot Trends 2021

She points to the UK as an example. British manufacturing has been historically reluctant to invest in automation, which now, especially in light of Brexit, has created problems. Following the loss of much of the cheap labour from Eastern Europe on which it had for a long time relied, the many sectors lack the infrastructure needed for automation and are now playing a constant game of catchup.

This labour shortage has hit the country’s food and beverage sector particularly hard. Following the sudden loss of foreign workers, there were reports of fruit and vegetables being left unpicked and rotting in the fields.

But perhaps the darkest and most shocking example of the impact that the loss of workers and lack of investment in automation has had on the sector began in October this year. A severe shortage of butchers and abattoir workers meant that thousands of healthy pigs are now being culled and incinerated every week in order to make space on farms, with reports surfacing of farmers and vets even resorting to carrying out pig abortions in order to stem the crisis.

According to the IFR’s own figures, the UK lags well behind other European countries when it comes to annual installations of industrial robots, with ten times less than in Germany, four times less than Italy and less than half that of France, though it does predict growth in the double-digit percentage rates in 2021 and 2022 due to large tax incentives.

Outside of manufacturing, one sector that stands to be transformed by robotics is healthcare. This has become even more pertinent since Covid-19 struck. Given the intense pressure that the pandemic has put on hospitals and medical staff, and that robots don't catch coronavirus, the sector could benefit immensely from the implementation of automation, in particular with patient-facing tasks and with routine hospital floor work, freeing up nurses and doctors and keeping them safer.

Read more: Meet Hugo: Medtronic's surgical robot cleared for use in Europe

“There are many possible applications, especially with Covid-19. Robots could work on hospital floors, taking the temperatures of staff and visitors to check whether they could be infected. There are also telepresence robots that could enter a potentially contagious patient's room and allow the doctor and patient to talk without risk to the doctor but still allowing the human touch and direct relations. It's not the machine talking to the patient, but a person talking via that machine,” explained Bieller.

“There are also disinfection robots that can be used in public spaces. They can also provide support in lifting patients. They can essentially undertake tasks that would relieve nurses and allow them to get back to their original work.

“We saw in some hospitals, the lab work being automated because there were a lot of lab samples coming in during Covid-19. That can be done automatically because it just speeds up the process and we don't have to wait as long for results, which is beneficial for us all. And of course, we also see them in diagnosis and assisting in surgeries, as well as administering medication. It's incredible all the applications.”

One of Dr Bieller's personal passions is opening up STEM careers for women and girls. Originally a chemist by training, she says that she is still surprised to see the share of women in STEM subjects at universities declining from year to year. 

“It's a pity because we're losing so many great minds unnecessarily. We have to push our efforts to change that. I think it's also a cultural thing. In many countries, it's still seen as okay to not be good in STEM subjects and we need to change that attitude,” she said.

Read more: Women in STEM - Interview with Econic CEO Dr Rowena Sellens

“When politicians can say, 'oh, I never understood maths', then we're not going anywhere. It's a change of thinking that is required.”

And while there have been signs suggesting that this may be changing, that change is slow, and her concern is that we run the risk of making the same mistakes with up and coming generations.

“We are losing a great chance for the workforce. I mean, it's half of society, half of the population we're leaving out. And I think it's that mix of women and men working together that brings us further than just men or just women ever could.”

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