The Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport held a meeting to review the achievements and future plans following the announcement of the smart city promotion strategy, and to discuss development plans for smart cities, including national pilot cities.

The government is promoting the creation and expansion of smart cities so that the new changes of the Fourth Industrial Revolution can be integrated into cities, making the cities themselves a driving force for innovative growth and improving the quality of life for citizens.

To this end, we are focusing on the National Pilot City Development Project, a leading model for future smart cities, and R&D for building data-based smart cities, while simultaneously pursuing efforts such as regulatory improvements and international cooperation.

The government plans to streamline the project implementation system by selecting a Master Planner (MP) to lead the development of the pilot city and forming a dedicated support team. Furthermore, the government intends to work toward preparing a basic conceptual plan and implementation plan within the year, centered around the MP, so that site development can commence in the first half of next year.

In addition, the government is also pursuing demonstration-type research and development that includes data-based intelligent urban operation—the core of smart cities—the development of citizen-centric services through the linkage and utilization of various data such as transportation, energy, and the environment, and the verification of new business models.

After completing the formation of an operating committee for the project ('18. 2.), etc., a public call for proposals to select two demonstration cities has been conducted since last March (March 30 – May. 29.) is currently underway, and in the second half of this year, a project site will be selected and full-scale research will begin.

The creation and expansion of smart cities in existing and aging cities is also continuing. First, among the Urban Regeneration New Deal target sites, at least five are selected annually as 'Smart City-type Urban Regeneration' project sites to provide consulting and additional budget support.

Meanwhile, we are listening to suggestions and focusing on regulatory improvements to enable various private companies to participate in the creation and expansion of smart cities. In this regard, an amendment to the Smart City Act was proposed (March 2018), which includes various special provisions to foster new industries and the introduction of innovation growth promotion zones to attract private investment through the relaxation of location regulations and licensing matters.

In addition, efforts to support the overseas expansion of domestic companies are also being made through international cooperation, such as proposing smart city cooperation to Vietnam and Singapore (March 2018) and signing a ministerial-level memorandum of understanding with Peru (March 2018).

In particular, we plan to attend the 'ASEAN Smart City Network*' workshop held in Singapore starting May 22 to introduce Korea's smart cities and discuss specific cooperation plans with 10 ASEAN countries.

An official from the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport stated, “We are implementing the ‘Smart City Promotion Strategy’ announced last January without any setbacks,” adding, “To create national pilot cities, we are thoroughly reviewing measures to achieve new challenges and innovations by having various stakeholders, including private companies and citizens, participate together from the urban planning stage. We plan to develop a basic conceptual plan to realize this as soon as possible by concentrating the capabilities of relevant ministries and agencies, led by the master planner.”