More than 200 participants discussed the effective use of technology in the changing city life with the pandemic process in the workshop organized by IMM Directorate of Information Technologies, Smart City Directorate, İPA, BİMTAŞ and EY. Making the opening speech of the workshop, IMM Secretary General Can Akın Çağlar said, “It is the priority of IMM to equip our city with smart technologies while serving 16 million people.”
The IMM Smart City Directorate of Department of Information Technologies organized the “Vision and Mission Determination Workshop”, which is the first in the series of studies revising the vision and road map for Istanbul’s smart city and innovation ecosystem in the changing world.
The IMM Smart City Strategic Plan is the first plan of our country at the local government level. The plan also defines action areas and projects in different dimensions of urban life (environment, transport, energy, etc.). Thus, it is aimed to make the “Sustainable Development Goals” (SDGs) applicable at a local scale.
Smart City is a part of IMM’s Motto
Making the opening speech of the workshop, IMM Secretary-General Can Akın Çağlar expressed the importance IMM attaches to the “Smart City” vision with the following words:
“While serving 16 million people, our general motto is; To be able to add value to the city while solving the problems of the citizen. It is among our priorities to be able to use technology to fulfill these two purposes in today’s world: to make the city smart with all technological developments, and to provide services in a way that can make life easier for our people. ”
INCOME INEQUALITY HAS INCREASED EIGHT Times
The workshop program continued with the presentation of the IMM Smart City Directorate after the opening speech. The presentation, which started with the explanation of the trends that transform the world, proceeded with the explanation of the future business world and trends. In the presentation, which also shared remarkable information about Istanbul, it was stated that between 2006 and 2018, the inequality in income distribution in Istanbul increased, and the difference between the highest and lowest income group increased eight times.
As a result of the researches in the field of transportation, which is one of the most important themes among the Smart City concepts, Istanbul was ranked 9th in 2019 in terms of traffic congestion and 5th as of 2020.
Another remarkable information in the presentation is that while Istanbul’s net internal migration rate was 7.9 percent in 2019, it was measured as -3.4 percent in contrast to the increase in 2020. In the light of the data transferred: It was seen that the changes brought by fundamental forces such as population growth, economic uncertainties, and climate change had a direct impact on the needs of Istanbul.
EFFECT OF 100 CITIES ON CARBON EMISSIONS IS 18 PERCENT
In the workshop information presentation, reasons such as rapid urbanization and population growth, climate change, economic uncertainties, and inability to keep up with technology; It was stated that cities have difficulties in planning and implementing basic needs such as infrastructure, urbanization, energy, and transportation. As a result of the researches, it was stated that 100 cities, including Istanbul, had an 18 percent impact on carbon emissions in the world.
The researches made by the Istanbul Planning Agency on the subject were also included in the presentation. Carbon emissions must be reduced by at least 40 percent in 2030 for Istanbul to achieve its goal of becoming a low-carbon city by 2050. In this sense, updating the current index and citizen needs is carried out by the IMM Smart City Directorate in order to quickly complete the transformation of Istanbul into the city of the future. With the “Vision and Mission Determination Workshop”, these steps will be completed quickly and smart city thematic workshops will be held by the directorate in the coming days.
13 VISIONS, 13 MISSIONS
Many representatives from IMM and its affiliate companies, district municipalities, ministries, academia world, NGOs, and the private sector participated in the workshop. A 4-hour online workshop was held with more than 200 participants. In the workshop where 13 different groups were formed, the participants carried out active work and created their vision and mission statements specific to the Smart City Istanbul. “13 visions and 13 mission statements” that emerged after two hours of group work were explained to all participants.
Following the statements, the participants voted on the online method, first “vision statements” and then “mission statements” over the application. After the announcement of the voting results, the participants took the floor and stated that the workshop was very useful and enjoyable.
Some representatives said that it was very important for IMM to bring together all sector representatives in this study, and it was stated that it is great value for the IMM Smart City Directorate to carry out and finalize these works with Istanbulites who live in Istanbul and love Istanbul.
