Technology and Innovation to Improve Quality of Life in Cities

The Forum brought together representatives of the government of Venezuela, representatives of the government of Korea, public and private institutions, and CAF specialists in the area, to present experiences in the development of smart cities in South Korea and some Latin American cities, the barriers and best practices in Latin America regarding the deployment of telecommunications infrastructure.

The keynote speakers were Blanca Alarcón, senior specialist in the Analysis and Sectoral Programming Department at CAF and Taeoh Kim, advisor to the Embassy of South Korea, in charge of economic cooperation, who highlighted the importance of these forums to share experiences and lessons learned on the road to defining strategies for the development of cities and the implementation of the latest technological advances to improve efficiency of urban management and environmental protection, and significantly reduce carbon emissions.

In her speech, Blanca Alarcón referred to CAF’s Digital Transformation Program, which promotes a comprehensive action for the expansion of the digital ecosystem and economy in Latin America and the Caribbean as a means to advance the productive transformation process and regional integration. With this vision, we seek to increase investment in broadband communications infrastructure that supports the expansion of digital services for households, governments and businesses, and especially those that have a significant impact on competitiveness of the production sector.

Since the early 2000s, smart cities have been created with the implementation of information and communication technologies (ICTs) in the development of new urban areas. South Korea has gained experience and expertise in this type of development. Through these events we seek to share knowledge and experience in order to come up with solutions, through smart cities, to the many urban problems in cities around the world, said Mr. Taeoh Kim.

During the event, Sang-hun Lee (PhD), researcher at the Land and Housing Research Institute of the Korean Land and Housing Corporation, announced important advances in the development model of new cities in South Korea, and the public policy on smart cities.

In his presentation, Lee presented cases of ongoing international cooperation projects in Kuwait, India, Vietnam and Bolivia. He explained a smart city mega-project in the making, the new Santa Cruz, a city designed for 370,000 inhabitants with a total investment of US$2.5 billion, which is intended to become a sustainable city that implements environmentally friendly information and communication technologies to achieve greater efficiency in urban issues such as transport, logistics, crime prevention, disaster prevention, energy, environment, water use, housing and social well-being and the solution to urban problems.

The Forum also featured top representatives of the telecommunications sector in Venezuela, Anthoni Camilo Torres, Venezuela’s vice minister for ICT Development, Angel Duque, Director of Public Relations and Corporate Communications at Huawei Technologies in Venezuela, Alfredo Avendaño, President of Level 3 Communications - Venezuela, in a panel moderated by Carlos Delgado, Director of the UCAB Communication Research Center, who discussed the situation of the digital infrastructure and the foundations for digitization of cities in Venezuela.

In addition, Mauricio Agudelo, ICT and telecom specialist at CAF, shared with attendees the results of the report “Mobile broadband expansion: Elimination of barriers to mobile broadband expansion at sub-national level,” carried out by CAF—development bank of Latin America—, which identifies barriers such as the lack of regulatory uniformity, regulation on the rights of way, continuity of local decisions, of legal certainty, restriction on use of land, ignorance of the law, among others.

Broadband, both fixed and mobile, directly and indirectly stimulates a nation’s economic growth and contributes to GDP growth and employment. It also indirectly contributes to improving productivity of cities and, subsequently, generates new business activities and fosters entrepreneurship.

The recommendations for promoting the development of mobile broadband infrastructure at the subnational level, as a way of expanding connectivity in Latin America and the Caribbean, emerge from the best practices identified in 10 countries including Argentina, Brazil, Colombia, Chile, Spain, Mexico and Peru, and are divided into four categories: procedures for deployment, health, environment and technology.

Key recommendations include: Considering broadband as a service of general interest; establishing a common single-window system; creating codes of good practices and ordinance models; establishing strict, but not prohibitive conditions in places of cultural and heritage or environmental preservation; establishing the maximum levels of exposure to non-ionizing radiation in the regulation in line with international standards, without differentiating between rural, urban or special locations or between regions; introducing measures that favor the emergence of independent tower operators, among others.

Also, Agudelo presented the results of the study on identification of best practices in cities for broadband expansion in Latin America, through which CAF and cet.la have built the first index that measures the degree of suitability of a municipality for the deployment of digital infrastructure.

The last segment of the event featured a distinguished panel consisting of representatives of universities and telecommunications operators. Elzoni Luckert, manager of Engineering Presales of Corporate Services of Telefónica Venezolana and Ricardo Martinez, President of Casetel, among others, who talked about best practices for broadband deployment in Venezuelan cities.

The closing of the event featured Hely Olivares, chief executive of the Directorate of Operational Innovation and Knowledge Management of the vice presidency of Social Development, who stressed the importance of this type of events to identify the most effective actions being successfully carried out in the region, and in this case in Venezuela, to pave the way towards comprehensive development of Latin American cities.