APEC TEL58 has a strong emphasis on the issues of transforming from traditional telecommunications to a digital economy through emerging ICT applications. The Industry Roundtable on "Smart City Experience Sharing" has been arranged by NCC to take place on October 2. The participating member economies have discussed the smart city issues and development, exchanged experiences, and proposed relevant promotion strategies to promote the sustainable development of smart cities.
This roundtable was convened by Mr. Liang-Jiun Jiang, Deputy Executive Director of Telecom Technology Center of Chinese Taipei and placed focus on three main areas of discussion:. "Vision of a Sustainable Smart City: Opportunities and Challenges," "Applications on Sustainable Smart Cities: Services and Solutions," and "Public-Private Partnerships in Sustainable Smart Cities: Cooperation and Coordination,"
Mr. Tran Trong Dung (a delegate from the Ministry of Information and Communications of Vietnam), Maggie Chao (project manager of the Development Project Office , Ministry of Economic Affairs of Chinese Taipei), Ms. Janice Lai (general manager of NEC, Japan), Dr. Makoto Yokozawa (Nomura Research Institute, Japan), Mrs. Sofia Soeria Atmadja (representative from Ministry of Communications and Information Technology, Indonesia), Dr. Hau Chen Mike Lee (Senior Advisor of Far EasTone Communication, Chinese Taipei), Dr. Chen-Yu Lee (Taipei Smart City Project Management Office, Chinese Taipei), and Dr. Supakorn Siddhichai (Digital Economy Promotion Agency, Thailand) were invited to share briefings on their economy’s promotion and development of smart cities.
NCC noted that with global economy booming, urbanization has become a prevailing phenomenon around the world. High population density in cities have brought a series of challenges for administrations, such as waste management, traffic congestion and energy consumption. Hence, utilizing technology to facilitate smart management of our cities has become an important issue. In addition, it is has become essential to determine who or what organizations are going to be responsible for smart city planning. Considering the dynamics of each city is complex encompassing multiple enterprises and relevant parties, establishing more public-private partnerships would not only be an efficient way to accelerate the city development, but also an opportunity to strengthen collaboration among stakeholders.
Given that smart cities are an important global development trend, NCC stated that smart city is therefore one of the holistic strategies which endeavors to provide sustainable city management with a combination of state-of-art technologies and innovative applications. For instance, based on the progress of 5G, IoT and artificial intelligence, a wide range of applications, such as autonomous vehicles, smart meters and face recognition can be utilized in various scenarios of a future city.
For the first topic, "Vision of a Sustainable Smart City: Opportunities and Challenges," Mr. Tran Trong Dung of Vietnam Telecommunication Authority commenced the first session by talking about the vision, initiatives and executive master plan promoted by the Viet Nam government in his presentation, entitled “Building Smart Cities in Viet Nam”, describing Vietnam's vision and policies on promoting smart cities, using Ho Chi Minh City's smart city solution as an example to show smart solutions can be supported from the top down and meet local needs from the bottom up.
The project manager of the Development Project Office , Ministry of Economic Affairs of Chinese Taipei, Ms. Maggie Chao, introduced the key promotion points of “Smart City 3.0” to the participants in the speech entitled “Smart City Innovation and Future Cooperation Opportunities in Formosa,” demonstrating the evolution of smart city policy before highlighting the best practices in diversified fields.
The second session, "Applications on Sustainable Smart Cities: Services and Solutions," the general manager of NEC, Japan, Ms. Janice Lai, described how the use of artificial intelligence technology has developed the "Image Recognition System on Pavement Damage;" Dr. Makoto Yokozawa, Nomura Research Institute, Japan, used the theme of "Smart Cities, Smart Communities, and Society 5.0" to discuss the sustainable smart city; the representative from Ministry of Communications and Information Technology, Indonesia, Mrs. Sofia Soeria Atmadja, shared the Indonesian government’s initiatives of the 100 Smart City project; the Senior Advisor of Far EasTone Communications, Dr. Hau Chen Mike Lee, shared the practical applications of Tainan Smart Public Transportation System and Air Quality Forecast.
For the third session, "Public-Private Partnerships in Sustainable Smart Cities: Cooperation and Coordination ," Dr. Chen-Yu Lee from Taipei Smart City Project Management Office shared the concept of "Living Lab" created from the latest smart city plan the government introduced from the private sector, allowing the local implementation of innovative technology; finally, Dr. Supakorn Siddhichai from the Thailand’s Digital Economy Promotion Agency shared the Thai government’s measures of creating investment incentives, deregulations, and setting up smart city infrastructure funds. The participants all agreed that public-private partnership and public participation are the key factors for a sustainable smart city.
NCC stated further that in order to allow the international delegates deepen their understanding of smart city applications in Taiwan, delegates were offered an on-site visit of the Taipei Far Eastern Telecom Park (T-park) in the afternoon. T-park is our first ICT platform to realize the localized microclimate model and flood management system, as well as a green ecological environment. Through the holistic project including hospitals, libraries and universities, it combines the shared vision and collaboration among government, urban planners and industry leaders. The region has been transformed from a textile ground to a smart community, enabling smart transportation, safety, education, telemedicine and environmental sustainability. The delegates expressed that they were deeply impressed by the strength of the technology and innovative applications in the domestic ICT industry.
Other on-site visits have been arranged for the international delegates so they can deepen their understanding of the current status of our efforts to promote universal service, digital applications, and infrastructure in remote areas, and the results of our striving to expand the smart city scope. Those with interest in the Regulatory Roundtable of "Best Practice for Promoting Universal Broadband Service" were offered a technical on-site to Wulai District of New Taipei City, visiting Wulai District Office for the implementation of the Gbps broadband service to the township plan, and the Wulai District Public Health Center for the demonstration of the digital medical applications such as remote care, electronic medical records, etc., as well as observing a demonstration of the photochemical transfer box, Wi-Fi implementation, multi-function telecom cards, etc. The visits to these remote areas allowed the delegates to view, first-hand, NCC’s efforts in promoting the universal services applications and telecommunications network infrastructure in remote areas and laying the foundation for the development of smart applications.
NCC stressed that with the solid foundation of the ICT industry, we are becoming a key player in the "global smart city supply chain" and that smart city development is one of the major goals of the “Digital Innovation & Governance Initiative Program” (DIGI+ program) promoted by the Executive Yuan. Our smart cities must be internationalized, and the APEC meeting is the best platform for experience sharing and cooperation. NCC has expressed its commitment to strengthening ties among government, industry, academia, and research units, as well as to the member economies of APEC and the international community. Such opportunities for the sharing of best practices can also greatly contribute to regional cooperation.
