Djoomart Otorbaev: The future of smart cities in Asia is bright, attracting talents is key

Djoomart Otorbaev: The future of smart cities in Asia is bright, attracting talents is key

Djoomart Otorbaev,Former Prime Minister of Kyrgyzstan; Senior Visiting Fellow of iGCU

Distinguished guests, ladies and gentlemen,

It is my privilege to be able to speak today for the plenary session of the Asia Smart City Forum. I am sure that the forum will be a success.

Why? It is because of the quality of agenda, especially the high ranking of participants. Though you will be making a lot of debates and discussions on what to do next in your agenda, it will bring fruitful results, not only theoretical, like many researchers of science do, but practical.

The UN Institution for Economic Social Affairs calculated and estimated that by 2050, an astonishing sixty eight percent of the world population will live in cities. In terms of Asia as a whole in that development, it will be very important. We know that fifty four percent of the urban population around the world live in Asia. By 2050, Asia will generate more than fifty percent of world GDP. It will be a leading force around the world. That is why the theme of the forum on Asia Smart City is very timely and important.

Competition is very important, for everything, including the comparison of which cities are doing the best in bringing quality of life for its citizens. This is my evaluation system. It must be straightforward, practical, and efficient. In order to compare how different competitive institutions compete with each other. That is why the smart city ranking which will be discussed during this conference is very important.

I believe that modernization will be the driving force of development in the 21st century. What do I mean by modernization? Modernization means that we need to attract talents. And all these talents should work hard to produce more scientific discoveries and inventions. We need more Nobel Prize laureates which will be generated in certain parts of the world. So competition will be good and those cities, which will create better living conditions for the talents, will be winners of the 21st century competition. So I believe that it is extremely important to be able to create a favorable condition for citizens to live, especially to attract talents to one place or another.

I think that China and Asia can do it. Just one example, I went to Shanghai for the first time around twenty years ago. At that time I met with the heads of the municipal government in Shanghai city and I asked them, “what are your priorities in your work?” The answer was surprising for me at that time, which was a long time ago.

They said we need to create a good quality of life for citizens by providing clean air, excellent logistics, the best sport events, the best cultural events, and the best museum expositions around the world.

It was very interesting and smart to observe the development of Shanghai. I have seen that many of those goals were already executed. There are already good practices and good experiences. All growing Asian countries need to cooperate with each other to bring new ideas to those very very key important areas.

I believe that debates of this forum will bring a lot of fruitful results and smart cities in Asia will be competing successfully with the rest of the world!

Success to your conference!

Thank you!