WeGO and Asocapitales Sign Memorandum of Understanding to Enhance Smart City Development
Seoul, July 16th, 2024 – The World Smart Sustainable Cities Organization (WeGO) and the Asociación Colombiana de Ciudades Capitales (Asocapitales) have signed a landmark Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) to formalize their collaboration in advancing smart city development, innovation, and sustainable urbanization.
This agreement follows the success of a mission in February 2024, co-organized by the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB), Asocapitales, the Colombian Embassy in Korea, and WeGO, which brought four newly elected mayors and one governor from Colombia to Korea. This mission laid the groundwork for this strategic partnership, and offered Colombian officials firsthand insights into Korea’s smart city initiatives and fostering dialogues on how these practices could be adapted to Colombian cities. A remarkable outcome of this mission was Cali joining as a WeGO member, with WeGO collaborating with the city on the upcoming Biodiversity COP16, a major international conference focused on global biodiversity conservation and sustainable use.
The MoU between WeGO and Asocapitales underscores their commitment to promoting smart, sustainable urban solutions through knowledge sharing, capacity building, and exchanging best practices in smart city initiatives. WeGO and Asocapitales will collaborate on networking efforts, participate in conferences, forums, and events to enhance visibility, exchange ideas, identify and implement joint projects to address common urban challenges and focus on smart city development and digital innovation.
WeGO, as a global platform, will provide its expertise in smart city solutions and best practices, facilitating networking opportunities and knowledge-sharing platforms for capital cities. Asocapitales, representing Colombia’s capital cities, will serve as a bridge between its member cities and WeGO, promoting awareness and adoption of smart city principles and initiatives among its network.
“We are thrilled to formalize our partnership with Asocapitales. This MoU will enable us to work closely with Colombian cities to foster innovation and sustainable urban development,” said Ms. Jung Sook Park, Secretary General of WeGO. “Our collaboration, which began with the mission in February, is a testament to the shared vision and commitment of both organizations to smart, sustainable cities.”
By joining forces, WeGO and Asocapitales aim to make a significant impact on the future of urban development, ensuring that cities are not only smarter but also more sustainable and resilient. Additionally, this MoU will serve as an important milestone to further expand WeGO’s Latin America Smart City Network (LASCN) initiatives, opening new avenues for collaboration and innovation in smart city development across the region.
About WeGO
The World Smart Sustainable Cities Organization (WeGO), is a membership-based international association of local governments, smart tech solution providers, and institutions committed to the transformation of cities into smart sustainable cities through facilitating public-private partnerships (PPP). WeGO was founded by 50 member cities in 2010 as the World e-Governments Organization, hence our acronym. In response to the evolving concept of smart cities, WeGO expanded its vision and mandate at the 7th General Assembly (2017) and its name to the World Smart Sustainable Cities Organization. WeGO’s Secretariat is based in Seoul, Korea, and has regional offices in East Asia (Chengdu, China), the Mediterranean (Beyoglu, Turkey), Africa (Abuja, Nigeria), Middle East & North Africa (Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates), Latin America (Cuenca, Ecuador), and Central Asia (Almaty, Kazakhstan). As the leading platform on smart city development, WeGO’s mission is to share knowledge and good practices in e-Governance; strengthen administrative efficiency and transparency; advance digital capacity; facilitate civic involvement; bridge the digital divide and inequality; and promote cooperation solidarity among cities and local governments around the world.
WeGO serves for its members as their international platform to improve the quality of life, innovate in the delivery of public services, and strengthen regional competitiveness.
Press Contact:
Name: Kakim Danabayev
E-mail: kakim@we-gov.org
Phone: +82-70-4202-9169