HCM CITY — Secretary of the HCM Party Committee Nguyễn Thiện Nhân has called on the IT and telecommunications sectors to work closely with local agencies in smart-city development.

“Traffic congestion and floods continue to occur. We need smart city forecasting and solutions,” Nhân said at a meeting with the city People’s Committee and members of the IT and telecommunications community held on Wednesday.

The city planned to carry out simulations on urban traffic, the economy, and floods, he added.  

Under the smart urban area project, there will be four centres. One will be a shared database and open database eco-system and another will integrate all the city’s information sources and databases from various departments and district committees.

The others will be used for simulations to forecast socio-economic strategy, and on information security.

Trần Vĩnh Tuyến, deputy chairman of the city People’s Committee, said that students at schools would be taught about smart city issues.  

Nhân said the city should learn from other countries but that products and technologies for the project’s implementation should be from Vietnamese.

The city, which covers more than 2,000 square kilometres, with a population of 10 million, would develop the smart city plan in gradual phases.

The city’s eastern region including District 2, 9 and Thủ Đức would be given priority, he added.

The region is near the city’s centre and has land for new infrastructure and facilities. The area also has a buffer zone to encourage innovation and startups.

“This would be the first smart urban centre, which will help speed up the project,” Nhân said.

He instructed all city departments to assess the development of IT and telecommunications industries with detailed figures.

The city has nearly 80,000 people working in these industries, accounting for 1.86 per cent of its total labour force.

“This is too low,” Nhân said.

Việt Nam National University- HCM City said it would train more IT students in coming years.  

Many enterprises and startups have asked the city to give them preferential treatment so they can be part of the smart city project.

Phí Anh Tuấn, vice chairman of HCM City Computer Association, said that preferential tariffs or other preferences should be provided to enterprises that use software produced by local companies. —VNS