Kyoung-Yul Bae of the Korea Information Society Development Institute (KISDI) emphasized the role of broadband in achieving SDGs by 2030 in his speech at the Broadband Committee’s second-half general meeting.
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o Date: September 16, 2023 (Sat) 13:00-20:30
o Venue: United Nations Headquarters in New York, USA
o Manager: International Telecommunication Union (ITU) and United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO)
o Subject: Digital connectivity: a transformative opportunity

The Korea Information Society Development Institute (KISDI) announced that its president, Kyoung-Yul Bae, had been invited as a special guest to the general meeting of the Broadband Committee in the second half of 2023, where he delivered a speech on the role of broadband in achieving SDGs* by 2030 at the United Nations headquarters in New York, USA on September 16.
*SDGs: Sustainable Development Goals.

The Broadband Committee was co-founded by the ITU and UNESCO in 2010 to spread broadband around the world. The recent general meeting was held to discuss funding and investment measures aimed at achieving universal significant connectivity by 2030 by connecting 2.6 billion people who do not yet have online connections.

Dr. Bae explained that Korea was able to launch 5G commercial services for the first time in the world because of the close cooperation between the government, relevant agencies, and telecommunications companies, and emphasized the importance of promoting competition in the broadband market and providing a wide range of digital services and digital literacy campaigns to promote broadband demand. He also announced that KISDI intends to share Korea's experience and strategy with other countries to help all people worldwide connect online and enjoy digital benefits.

In addition to the Broadband Committee’s general meeting, Dr. Bae attended, and delivered a speech at, the SDG Digital Day organized by the ITU and the UN Development Plan (UNDP) on September 17.

The SDG Digital Day event was held to accelerate the achievement of seventeen SDGs by 2030 and brought together governments, international organizations, the private sector, academia, civil society, and young people in order to discuss digital-based solutions for promoting the achievement of the SDGs and to introduce national success stories in digital transformation.

In his speech, Dr. Bae emphasized the role of digital technologies, including AI, in achieving the SDGs focused on “providing quality education” (SDG4), “responding to climate change” (SDG13), “creating sustainable cities and communities” (SDG11), and “reducing inequality” (SDG10). In particular, he highlighted the importance of sharing the best policy cases for building an institutional framework, and disclosed that KISDI intended to position itself at the forefront of efforts to actively share Korea's best digital policy cases.