Press Releases

The Smart city concept is not just a current trend but it is the philosophy of modern and future urban planning. According to the World Bank, 55% of the population, at a global level, lives in urban areas today. By 2045, the number of people living in cities will increase by 50%, adding 2 billion more residents in urban areas.

The “Smart City” concept is high priority in our agenda. In fact, we do expect a lot of benefits for our citizens and our cities from becoming ‘’smart’’, such as:

• efficiency
• sustainability
• participation of society and
• better quality of life.

In describing what a ‘’smart city’’ looks like, it is commonly agreed that a “smart city” uses a lot of technology, combines energy, mobility and infrastructure, increases performance and efficiency, increases the participation of citizens, enables innovation and improves the social and economic fabric of the city.

Our Ministry, has already recognized how imperative is to boost the efforts of our cities and communities to become “Smart”. We are encouraging strategic initiatives and actions that will result in the implementation of small or large scale projects and in best practices regarding knowledge sharing.

Our capital city, Nicosia, represents a very good example of that, as classic infrastructure and city regeneration projects under implementation, have incorporated a full list of smart solutions based on the city’s Smart Strategy. This is exactly the way we will design all our future interventions to the areas of our responsibility: “SMART by DESIGN”.

Finally, I would like to welcome you all to the city of Larnaca. I really believe in and I will support all the efforts of the city to become “lighthouse of innovation” in blue economy and maritime transport.

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(DC)