Debates on urban innovation and solutions for the future of cities around the world dominated the panels, lectures and stands at Smart City Expo Curitiba 2018, which received more than 8,000 participants between Wednesday (28) and Thursday (1), at Expo Renault Barigui, a number that exceeded the organization's expectations. The congress had the institutional support of ABES and the participation of Jamile Sabatini Marques, director of innovation and promotion of the entity. "The event was able to emphasize the importance of innovation as a driver of economic development. We also verified the presence of representatives of the public power, fundamental participation for the dissemination of a new way of thinking about the future of Brazilian cities", highlighted Jamile.
“The event was a success, both in terms of the participation of delegates and the contribution of speakers and exhibitors. The country and Curitiba are now part of the select group of smart cities that host an event endorsed by Fira Barcelona”, celebrates André Telles, director of iCtities, who organized the congress together with the WTC Business Club Curitiba and the City Hall of Curitiba .
Blockchain and the future of cities
With the main plenary packed, more than 800 participants heard the testimony of British entrepreneur, author and speaker Tia Kansara, from Replenish Eart, an expert in sustainable cities. The topic addressed was the transformations that blockchain can bring to smart cities.
“By 2050, we will have 66% of the world's population living in cities. It is almost double our current reality. For the multidimensional problems that this scenario will generate, we need multidimensional technological solutions. In this sense, the use of blockchains removes the need for intermediaries such as government and banking institutions to manage the relationships between people and companies”, details Kansara.
This decentralized system, according to the expert, generates a huge amount of shared memory in the next generation of the internet, which will impact cities. “Each interaction we make generates a permanent change in the network, in addition to creating our digital avatars, with all our user behavior. Issues such as IOT Security, privacy, new economic models and anti-corruption are related to this blockchain reality”.
Tia Kansara ended her talk with a question/provocation, which summarizes the feeling of the debates at Smart City Expo Curitiba: if you had a digital ear in every building in the city, what would you like to hear from this building?
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A reference in the country when it comes to sustainability, journalist André Trigueiro, a specialist in environmental management, gave the opening lecture for the second day of Smart City Expo 2018, on Thursday morning (1st). Presenter and editor-in-chief since 2006 of the GloboNews program “Cidades e Soluções”, Trigueiro addressed the issue of a sustainable future for our cities, without which – as he emphasized – intelligent and technological solutions become useless.
“The municipal reality in Brazil is far from the smart city concept. Our municipalities are poor and in default, with mayors who are often functionally illiterate without teams trained to write the projects, to request the existing funds in Brasilia. In this context, the initial planning for these municipalities requires a diagnosis of problems, the gathering of qualified people and the search for material and human resources”, he highlighted.
Engaging future generations
A social responsibility project carried out since 2016 by iCities, in agreement with the Department of Education of the Municipality of Curitiba, iCities Kids also participated in the event. The objective of this social action is to promote the culture of smart cities for the new generations by serving about a thousand children per semester, coming from Curitiba's municipal schools.
“Our audience is children from six to eleven years old, who participate in workshops within an intelligent scenographic mini-city and learn about topics such as Robotics, Renewable Energies, Waste Management, Mobility and Citizenship. We believe that raising children's awareness is the first step towards the generation of conscious and transforming citizens of the cities where they live”, said André Telles, co-founder, director of iCities and organizer of Smart City Expo.
iCities Kids is coordinated by Professor Érica Nickel, a specialist in traffic and urban mobility, a pedagogue graduated from UFPR, with a Master's in Education from PUC-PR, the university where she teaches. “During the workshops, kids learn that every choice has a consequence, both as individuals and for society, in the present and in the future. We work so that the little ones are human beings, professionals and entrepreneurs capable of creating innovative alternatives that bring quality of life to people”, he ponders.
ABES was represented by Jamile Marques, director of innovation and development
for the first time in Brazil
Smart City Expo Curitiba was the first Brazilian edition of Smart City Expo World Congress, held annually in Barcelona, the largest global event on the topic of Smart Cities, which brings together more than 18,000 people from 120 countries.
The event was endorsed by FIRA Barcelona Internacional – a public consortium formed by the City of Barcelona, the Government of Catalonia and the Barcelona Chamber of Commerce, and was organized by iCities, strategic support from the World Trade Center Business Club and official participation by the City of Curitiba. as hostess.
The Smart City Expo World Congress already takes place annually in other cities around the world such as Kyoto (Japan), Montreal (Canada), Puebla (Mexico), Casablanca (Morocco), Istanbul (Turkey), Bogotá (Colombia) and recently in Buenos Aires. Aires (Argentina).
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