Page 56 - Implementing ITU-T International Standards to Shape Smart Sustainable Cities: The Case of Singapore

Implementing ITU-T International Standards to Shape Smart Sustainable Cities –
The Case of Singapore

5. Conclusion
Singapore served as an ideal testbed for the
implementation of the KPIs developed by ITU for smart
sustainable cities, given the country’s defined national
strategy to transition into a smart and sustainable city in
the coming years. Through the lens of its Smart Nation
vision, Singapore has been using ICTs to enhance the way
its citizens live, work, play and interact.

It has been more than two years since Singapore
commenced its Smart Nation initiative, and one year
since the country collaborated with ITU on this two-year
pilot project to evaluate the feasibility of the ITU smart
sustainable city KPIs. From Singapore’s experience, the
following conclusions have been derived:
 Singapore concluded the first phase of the pilot project. Based on the findings in this
phase, the governmental agencies in Singapore have provided feedback on ITU KPIs.
Many of these suggestions were directed at improving the existing definitions of the
KPIs to enable a smoother data collection process.
 ICTs are a known key contributor to the Singaporean economy. Building on its strengths
and maintaining ICTs as a strategic lever, Singapore has adopted vibrant policies for ICT
diffusion and production. This has helped lay an excellent foundation upon which to
establish a smart and sustainable city. With its effective national policies and initiatives
in fostering ICT adoption, Singapore has become a leading country in ICT-readiness and
e-government performance. These aspects were clearly reflected in the good
performance of Singapore in the KPI dimensions of “ICT” and “Productivity”.

 Despite having made significant progress in the KPI dimensions for “ICT”, “Productivity”
and “Equality and Social Inclusion”, Singapore should divert more efforts to the
dimension of “Environmental sustainability” in order to drive sustained reduction in
greenhouse gas emissions; to promote noise-based monitoring systems; and to improve
public perception of the capital’s surroundings. Given the robust ICT-based
infrastructure the city-state already has at its disposal, with a few additional networked
applications, Singapore will soon be able to “climb the ladder” and become a leading
international city that fosters a secure urban ecosystem, underpinning the goals and
targets in the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development.

 As a part of the refinement process, ITU undertook a two-part approach to the indicators
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by preparing a basic set of core indicators which can be easily reported by most cities
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along with a list of advanced indicators. The advanced indicators can be implemented
by cities that have attained good scores on the basic indicators.

37 These core indicators will be divided into three types: generic, sustainable and smart.

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These advanced indicators will be divided into two types: smart and sustainable.

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