an old photo of shenzhen was displayed on the screen when nicolas gorjestani, a senior adviser for the world bank, talked about his first trip to shenzhen 37 years ago.
gorjestani was delivering a speech as a guest speaker during the 4th shenzhen international low carbon city forum held in longgang district on friday and saturday.
he said shenzhen had already become one of the best new cities by the end of the last century. "and then early in the 21st century, i learned from my friends that the goal was even higher - they were thinking of creating one of the first smart, low-carbon cities," he said.
gorjestani said the cities of 21st century are about sustainability, creativity and opportunity, and building an intelligent and low-carbon city requires three pillars: promoting environmentally sustainable living conditions, enabling innovation in enterprises, and creating a smart network of modern infrastructure and services.
he said industrial workers are usually motivated by good wages, but the knowledge workers of tomorrow are not necessarily only motivated by wages, because they need to see meaning and purpose in their jobs.
gorjestani hopes top-down management systems in the past will also transform into new ones that allow low-level connections to create deep collaboration.
"the intelligent city in the future is all about collaboration. it's not about the number of contacts you have, but how you really collaborate and how do you connect the brains ... in order to solve common troubles," he said.
patrick klugman, deputy mayor of paris, said city-to-city cooperation promoted by c40 cities climate leadership group (c40) has enabled cities to learn from the best sides of other cities to tackle climate change.
"in 11 years, c40 cities have delivered over 10,000 climate actions," he said, adding that c40 cities have set a goal of reducing co2 emissions by 645 tons by 2020.
c40 is a network of the world's megacities taking action to reduce greenhouse gas emission. it is composed of 83 member cities around the world, including paris and shenzhen.
shenzhen mayor xu qin also delivered a speech during the forum's opening ceremony.
xu said there are over 46,000 new-energy vehicles in shenzhen, and the city government will replace all 16,000 public buses in shenzhen with electric buses next year, which will reduce the city's greenhouse gas emissions.
nearly 2,000 guests from 40 countries and regions attended the forum, which was sponsored by the city government and organized by the city's development and reform commission.
an award ceremony was held saturday to announce winners of the 6th blue sky award, which honors the top 10 cutting-edge technologies with the most investment value in the global renewable energy sector, such as an aviation biofuel and a wind-powered heating system.
