A More Livable Future

  • 来源:中国与非洲
  • 关键字:Rapid urbanization ,forward ,citie
  • 发布时间:2019-12-25 07:23

  Rapid urbanization worldwide is not only helping to accelerate economic development, but is also bringing a negative impact on urban life, as seen from traffic congestion, loss in productive time and slow response to emergencies. China is no exception. To deal with these big city malaises, China has made significant investment in building smart cities over the past decade.

  Smart city is an interesting concept. It was first put forward by the International Business Machines (IBM) Corp. in 2008. There is no globally recognized definition for a smart city, nor any standards for its development. Actually, it is a constantly evolving concept and keeps improving along with the technological, economic and social development. Despite its changing standards, the goals of building smart cities, undoubtedly, are to meet people’s demands, improve their life quality and enable sustainable development of cities by using high technologies, such as the Internet of Things, artificial intelligence, big data and cloud computing. Governments play a key role in promoting the construction of smart cities. In 2010, China launched an urban-based information technology application pilot project, and three years later, China launched the pilot project of building its first batch of smart cities.

  The year 2019 is a milestone for smart city development in China. On November 1, China officially launched its 5G services. In the 5G era, China’s smart cities will have better development thanks to its much faster data transmission rate and stronger connectivity.

  Statistics from the Super Smart City: Happier Society With Higher Quality, a report released by Deloitte this year, show that of the more than A More Livable Future1,000 smart cities worldwide, about a half are in China. With the fast development of 5G, China’s smart city development is in the fast lane.

  As smart city development is for improving people’s life quality, so people’s demands should be taken into consideration when designing smart city solutions. People need to live in comfortable and safe cities. According to Smart Cities: Digital Solutions for a More Livable Future released by McKinsey Global Institute in 2018, smart applications could potentially reduce fatalities (from homicide, road traffic, and fires) by 8 to 10 percent. In addition, smart systems can cut emergency response times by 20 to 35 percent. The report also predicts that by 2025, cities that deploy smart-mobility applications have the potential to cut commuting times by 15 to 20 percent on average.

  Africa, with a population of more than 1.2 billion, does not lag behind in developing smart cities, with the aim of improving people’s life quality and narrowing the digital divide with the rest of the world. Cape Town in South Africa and Nairobi in Kenya are among the most advanced cities in Africa on the smart city front. Other cities, such as Eko Atlantic City in Nigeria, Appolonia City in Ghana and La Cite du Fleuve in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, among others, are in the process of building their smart systems.

  As the world makes the transition from the third industrial revolution to the fourth, which features fast development of digital technologies such as big data, artificial intelligence and cloud computing, China and African countries can share experiences with each other, to make cities more livable for their people.

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