VOI - Voice of Indonesia | RRI - Radio Republik Indonesia

British Ambassador to Indonesia and Timor Leste Moazzam Malik said that his side would continue to strive to strengthen cooperation between Britain and ASEAN, including Indonesia as the largest country in the region. Therefore Moazzam Malik invited young Southeast Asian leaders to discuss in the UK-ASEAN Leadership program which took place in Jakarta recently. Before discussing with Moazzam Malik the young leaders held meetings with a number of parties in Jakarta and learned how to develop smart cities. During the discussion, Moazzam Malik told the media crew that the young leaders were learning about the role of technology to realize a smart city that could improve the quality of life and the welfare of its people.

“So, it is group of people from all of the 10 ASEAN countries. They spend the day together in conference. They spending three days now doing various discussions with various Indonesian actors, you know with banks, with NGOs, think-thanks. The end of the week they will come together and the theme as you know is around the smart cities, to understand how technology can be used to connect us, citizens with services and to improve quality of life and improve welfare and well-being. So, it is very important challenge because the future of the Asian region is increasingly urban and so far the urban area to succeed. We have got technology to raise the living standard,” said Moazzam Malik.

Moazam Malik further said, to realize a smart city needs concrete cooperation among cities in the world to know and learn the increasingly complex challenges and problems of the city. He then gave an example of the cooperation carried out by Surabaya city in East Java with Liverpool, England. The collaboration carried out by the two cities includes the development of creative economy, port management, smart city development, and capacity building of human resources (HR). According to Moazzam Malik, Surabaya learned a lot and learned lessons from the experience of Liverpool using technology in managing traffic, disasters, and ports. (VOI/Rezha/AHM)