Saudi Arabia gears up for first Global Smart City Forum

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Saudi Data and Artificial Intelligence Authority (SDAIA) is set to host the first Global Smart City Forum in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia in cooperation with the Ministry of Interior and the Ministry of Municipal and Rural Affairs and Housing.

The two-day event will be held at Riyadh Arena under the theme “A Better Life”; featuring some 80 speakers from 40 countries across the globe.

Through the Forum, SDAIA, the country's national reference for data and artificial intelligence, seeks to form an ambitious vision for the future of cities using smart solutions, and drawing up basic rules that support city development plans to achieve sustainable urban development, consistent with one of the Saudi Vision 2030 goals, which is improving the quality of life of citizens.

The forum is one of the steps taken towards making the kingdom a leader among economies based on data and AI, said the organiser SDAIA, which enjoys the support of His Royal Highness Prince Mohammed bin Salman bin Abdulaziz Al-Saud, Crown Prince and Prime Minister, who is also chairman of the Board of Directors of SDAIA.

The forum, it stated, aims to motivate businessmen from various countries to invest in smart innovative solutions to achieve a balance between human requirements and the economic prosperity of cities, and support the creation of safe and sustainable environments in which the elements of modern life are combined, including digital services that help bring about the well-being of citizens and improve safety, reduce energy consumption, create more job opportunities, develop education, and improve health care and transportation.

The key topics to be discussed at the forum include the future of smart cities, challenges facing their infrastructure as well as finding innovative solutions to confront the growing number of population of cities of the world, it stated.

Also the participants will get to learn about best practices in building smart cities as well as the latest technical developments and their applications in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, and from the experiences of other countries, in line with the aspirations of the Saudi Vision 2030 and the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals 2030.

These topics will be addressed in dialogue sessions and workshops in which senior officials, international experts in building and planning smart cities, investors, innovators, and economic policy makers of international organizations and non-profit institutions will be taking part.

According to SDAIA, the two-day event will back the efforts of governments around the world to adopt innovative models of smart solutions that contribute to improving public services and safety, and enhance environmental sustainability, with humans at the center of development.

The forum aspires to build a global platform for smart cities in the city of Riyadh that brings together experts in the field of building smart cities and AI, in order to discuss important topics related to the future of these cities and plan to build green cities based on data governance, enhanced innovation, and free of visual distortions and road congestion, it added.