Harness digital tech for tangible results Forum participants offer suggestions on how to leverage cyberspace advances for greater social and economic progress

By embracing digital technologies and innovative ideas, the ancient Palace Museum is gaining new vitality. We are now the most popular museum in the world, with 16.7 million visitors last year, about twice the number of the Louvre in France. We also have continuously expanded our display and exhibition space, while attracting new audiences on digital media. We have developed a wide range of mobile applications, introducing artifacts as well as Chinese history and culture to the public, to reach and engage more people.

director of the Palace Museum Chinese entrepreneurs have lots of ideas and the zeal to take risks and put these ideas into practice. I think we have a lot to learn from the (Chinese) entrepreneurs. Hopefully, we can learn from these and our experiences, both the positive and negative aspects. We can solve most of the problems if we join hands.

member of the Luxembourg Parliament and former vice-president of the European Commission Leveraging digital technologies to make education more accessible is one of the keys to closing the gap. Different from physical classrooms, digital or online education offers a way to boost teaching productivity. Education resources can flow across borders, and different levels of educational institutions can also cooperate with each other more deeply. Technological advances will give birth to a new human–machine collaboration system in education, which will involve personalized learning and intelligent interactive teaching methods.

president of Zhejiang University and an academician of the Chinese Academy of Sciences We are taking concrete steps to reduce the digital divide. We aim to provide fiber connectivity to all local government areas in Nigeria. We are also working to bring down government taxes and levies associated with rolling out broadband infrastructure in our country. Chinese companies like Huawei have played an important role in helping our push for digital inclusion and expanded access.

senior special assistant on media and publicity to the president of the Federal Republic of Nigeria We are happy to be a part of this global event. Access to digital use is becoming increasingly important in our day-today field activities, whether economically, politically or socially, in exchange of information and research.

first undersecretary of the Ministry of Trade, Industry and East Africa Community Affairs of the Republic of South Sudan The more we use digital technologies, the more we should make sure that every citizen has the knowledge and skills to seize the opportunities provided by the technologies. Our vision for Singapore is to be a Smart Nation — a nation where people live meaningful and fulfilled lives, enabled by technology, offering exciting opportunities to all of us. To achieve this, we must turn a digital divide into a digital multiplier. Specifically, we are trying to provide universal digital access to each citizen, ensure lifelong digital literacy through inter-generational teaching, and encourage citizens’ active digital participation in contributing ideas that could make the lives of Singaporeans better.

permanent secretary of the Ministry of Communications and Information of the Republic of Singapore

Shan Jixiang, Viviane Reding, Wu Zhaohui, Garba Shehu, Agak Achuil Lual, Gabriel Lim,

PHOTOS BY ZOU HONG / CHINA DAILY Liu Yuzhu (left), director of the State Administration of Cultural Heritage, speaks at the Ministerial Forum during the Fifth World Internet Conference on Thursday.