All districts will be expected to develop a “smart urban area” plan by 2020, Trần Vĩnh Tuyến, HCM City People’s Committee vice chairman and head of the smart city management board, said on Friday.

HCM City plans to become a smart urban area by 2020.

The smart urban area project will be piloted in districts 1 and 12 and the Thủ Thiêm Urban Area in District 2.

At a meeting on the smart urban project, Tuyến said all district authorities should develop plans that would easily link with other districts once project implementation begins throughout the entire city after the end of the pilot programme.

Flooding and traffic congestion remain problems that have not been solved with traditional methods, he said, adding that agencies and district authorities should take the initiative in solving these problems with IT applications.

Under the smart urban area project, there will be four centres: one on a shared database and open database eco-system; another that will integrate all the city’s information sources and databases from various departments and district committees; one used for simulations to forecast socio-economic strategy; and another on information security.

These centres are considered the four main pillars for implementation, Dương Anh Đức, head of the Department of Information and Communications, said.  

Trần Anh Tuấn of the HCM City Institute for Development Studies said the institute would be in charge of building the simulation centre, with co-operation from universities and others.

 According to Tuyến, these centres will only be able to operate effectively if they are linked with local systems to carry out the project.

This is the first time the city has created a specific roadmap for the smart urban project, with targets including sustainable development, improved quality of life, and more effective administration.

Representatives of districts 1 and 12 and the Thủ Thiêm Urban Area in District 2, which will pilot the project, said they have already made plans for implementation.

A representative of the People’s Committee in District 1 said the district would develop eight smart systems related to social order, education, healthcare, urban management, information security, and online administrative services.

He said the city should have a team including experts who can give advice for more effective implementation. An IT workforce should also be added to the committee, he said. — VNS