On the 20th, the National Data Bureau, together with the relevant departments, issued the ‘Guiding Opinions on Deepening the Development of Smart Cities and Promoting the Digital Transformation of the Whole City’, which focuses on the general requirements, promoting the digital transformation of the city in the whole field, enhancing the support of the digital transformation of the city in an all-round way, optimising the ecology of the digital transformation of the city in the whole process, as well as guaranteeing the measures and other five aspects of efforts to promote the digital transformation of the city in the whole area.

In the press conference held by the National Data Agency on the same day, the person in charge of the opinion was interpreted.

Why was the opinion formulated and issued?

Chen Ronghui, deputy director of the National Data Bureau, introduced that in recent years, China's rapid development of smart city construction, made a phased breakthrough, but also faces problems such as insufficient urban integration planning and construction, and insufficient industry-city synergy and linkage. In addition, along with the rapid development of artificial intelligence and other digital technologies, the value of data elements is becoming increasingly prominent, and the depth of integration and penetration of urban economic and social fields, driving the construction of China's smart city towards a new stage of ‘system reconstruction, quality and efficiency’ of the digital transformation of the whole region.

‘In order to comply with the new situation of the new period of smart city development, new requirements, we will work with the relevant departments to formulate the views of the data integration, development and utilisation throughout the construction of the city's digital transformation of the whole area, to better serve the city's high-quality development, high-efficiency governance, high quality of life.’ Chen Ronghui said.

The city is a comprehensive carrier to promote the construction of digital China. Chen Ronghui said that the views of the city as a carrier to promote the deep integration of digital technology and economy, governance, life, and promote the construction of digital China in the city comprehensive landing, and co-ordination of technology and facilities to empower the dual-wheel drive of the basic system innovation, focusing on the transformation of the city in the high-quality development of the industry and long-term operation.

How to promote the digital transformation of the whole region?

Opinions on the development of smart cities put forward the requirements of the digital transformation of the whole region, which, by 2027, the whole region of the national city digital transformation to achieve significant results, the formation of a number of horizontal through, vertical through, each with its own characteristics of livable, resilient, smart city, strong support for the construction of digital China.

For the ‘territory-wide digital transformation’, Wu Xiaoning, director of the Digital Economy Division of the National Data Bureau, specifically proposed ‘holistic reshaping of the smart city technology architecture, systematic changes in urban management processes, and integration to promote the deep integration of industry and city’. This transformation actually runs through the whole process of urban planning, construction, management, service and operation.

How to promote transformation? Wu Xiaoning said, focusing on the whole field to promote the digital transformation of the city, establish and improve the city digital common basic platform system; all-round enhancement of the digital transformation of the city to support the coordinated promotion of the city arithmetic network, data circulation and use of infrastructure construction; the whole process of optimisation of the digital transformation of the city ecological, speed up the promotion of the appropriate number of institutional innovations, and continue to innovate the operation and maintenance mode of the smart city.

How to understand the relationship between digital economy and smart city?

Opinions put forward to ‘cultivate and grow the urban digital economy’ and ‘promote the integration of new types of production and urban development’. Lu Dongsen, deputy director of the Digital Economy Division of the National Data Bureau, believes that the new era of smart city construction is to digitally drive the economic and social development of the city, to create a modernised version of the smart city, taking into account the modernisation of urban governance and modernisation of the industrial system. Digital economy and smart city in the new period has a symbiotic relationship of mutual promotion and synergistic development.

Lu Dongsen said, one hand, the digital economy is one of the important driving force of the construction of the smart city, the digital economy in the cultivation and growth of new momentum in industry, expanding the development of new space at the same time, with digital products and services to comprehensively empower the modernisation of the urban governance system and governance capacity; on the other hand, the smart city is the development of the digital economy is an important carrier and handholding for the development of the digital economy for the industrial agglomeration, the development of the digital economy to provide a wealth of application scenarios. It builds a verification and promotion platform for the integrated innovation and application of new digital technologies and products.

How to make smart city operation more sustainable?

For the lack of sustainability and other shortcomings of smart city operation and maintenance in recent years, Lu Dongsen said that the views from the operation system, operation mechanism and operation and maintenance methods on the direction of innovation, to accelerate the establishment of data operation, facilities operation, service operation of the three-dimensional operation system, to build the government, enterprises, scientific research and financial institutions, such as the construction of a multi-dimensional ecosystem, to accelerate the formation of an integrated, standardised smart city operation and maintenance system.

‘Considering the smart city “heavy construction, light operation” problem has a long history, built that is backward, on-line that is out of the phenomenon occurs from time to time.’ Lu Dongsen said that by exploring the establishment of the operating budget and evaluation and assessment mechanism oriented to the degree of problem solving, user satisfaction and other application effects, planning ahead of the operational priorities, through integrated planning, specialised construction, to achieve people's satisfaction with the results of the operation.