G20 and Japanese smart city association become latest partners of WeGO
May 13, 2020
SEOUL – WeGO has concluded an MOU with Smart City Institute Japan (SCI-J), Japan’s only smart city organization, and has agreed to implement an engagement plan with the G20’s Global Smart Cities Alliance (GSCA).
SCI-J is a national association of around 130 local governments, including most major cities like Tokyo and Osaka, and several ministries, such as the Ministry of Trade, Economy and Industry (METI) and the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure, Transport and Tourism (MLIT). Established in September 2019 by Mitsubishi and Nikkei, these multinational corporations stand for most of the funding of the organization, along with Google, Microsoft, IBM, NEC and Mitsui.
Similarly, GSCA was established on the initiative of Japan as host of G20 and unites various smart city stakeholders. The World Economy Forum’s Center for Fourth Industrial Revolution (C4IR) serves as its preliminary secretariat via its offices in Tokyo and San Francisco. Alongside SCI-J, WeGO partners ICLEI, India’s Smart Cities Mission, ITU, SCEWC, and UCLG are also institutional partners of the GSCA.
By working with SCI-J, WeGO hopes to extend opportunities to a broader group of stakeholders in Japan, including cities and solution providers, and collaborate on its work on regional networks such in Northeast and Southeast Asia. SCI-J is at present already assisting WeGO and the Trilateral Cooperation Secretariat (TCS) on the preparations of a series of online forums targeting Chinese, Japanese, and Korean cities. These webinars intend to facilitate the planning of transboundary joint projects that could dramatically change the landscape of public services for citizens in the region.
WeGO is supporting GSCA’s policy research initiative aimed at establishing a global framework for advanced cities across G20 by connecting the alliance with its relevant members. Ready for testing from October, cities who share their best practice will further have the opportunity to hold regional workshops for closed, contextualized testing of the global framework.
As the cooperative relationship with GSCA progresses over the coming months, WeGO plans to further develop its partnership through an MOU.