"Hangzhou is the top city of digital governance in China. The digital governance level of cities in the Yangtze River Delta region is significantly higher than the national average level. Cites around Hangzhou like Ningbo, Wenzhou, Huzhou, Jinhua, Jiaxing, and Shaoxing are in the top 30 of digital governance in China, among which Huzhou, Jinhua, Wenzhou, and Jiaxing are outstanding."

These are the information released on China's Urban Digital Governance Report (2020) delivered at the press conference in Beijing on August 18. 

(Photo via VCG)

China's Urban Digital Governance Report (2020) was formed by the joint efforts of China's economic information service, China Information Association, China urban planning, and Design Institute, and Randy International Think Tank. The sample is 100 cities in China that were listed with the help of an index evaluation system, data analysis, questionnaire, and case study.

"Hangzhou is truly the No.1 city of digital governance in China." Hangzhou City, as a classic case of domestic urban digital governance, was praised by experts at the meeting. In fact, Hangzhou created the country's first "city brain" in 2016, exploring the use of digital means to govern the city. In the same year, the G20 summit was held in Hangzhou, where figures were listed as an important topic of world economic growth for the first time. Meanwhile, Hangzhou took the lead in proposing the construction of the "city brain" in China, and took traffic management as a breakthrough point, hoping to open up information resources and drive urban governance by digital means.

At present, the "city brain" in Hangzhou has been fully spread to 11 systems and 48 application scenarios, including police, transportation, urban management, culture and tourism, health, housing management, emergency, agriculture, environmental protection, market supervision, and grassroots governance.

According to the report, the current level of urban digital governance in China has three significant characteristics:

According to the report, the 10 leading cities in digital governance in China are Hangzhou, Shenzhen, Beijing, Shanghai, Wuhan, Guangzhou, Zhengzhou, Suzhou, Dongguan, and Xi'an.

Among them, Hangzhou has obvious leading advantages, becoming the top one city in China in terms of digital governance level, which is significantly higher in the Yangtze River Delta region than the national average level.

From the report, the overall level of urban digital governance in China is still relatively low, and there is a gap between different cities.

Although second-tier cities such as Zhengzhou, Dongguan, and Suzhou perform well, whose urban development has improved from industry 1.0 to digital governance 2.0, the overall level of urban digital governance is still relatively low. Thus, the relevant cities should seize the opportunity to make up for the shortcomings.

The report shows that the overall level of digital governance is "high in the east and low in the west, high in the south and low in the north", but this does not mean that there is a "gap" in different locations.

When it comes to the implementation of digital governance, experts at the meeting generally believe that urban digital governance not only involves the adoption of emerging technologies but also involves the overall reform of the urban management system and operation mechanism. Therefore, it is believed that the third-tier and fourth-tier cities will usher in more opportunities.

(Compiled and translated by Xu Yuhong)