Alibaba Chairman Jack Ma warned on Monday that society could see decades of pain thanks to disruption caused by the internet and new technologies to different areas of the economy.

In a speech at a China Entrepreneur Club event, the billionaire urged governments to bring in education reform and outlined how humans need to work with machines.

"In the coming 30 years, the world's pain will be much more than happiness, because there are many more problems that we have come across," Ma said in Chinese, speaking about potential job disruptions caused by technology.

The Alibaba founder warned that social conflicts could have a "huge impact" on all walks of life. Ma's company has invested in areas such as cloud computing and artificial intelligence as it expands into new sectors beyond its e-commerce business.