Smart Cities for All Partners with Mexico’s Biggest Cities to Promote Digital Inclusion

ATLANTA, MEXICO CITY (August 05, 2019) —

This week, Smart Cities for All, a project of the Global Initiative for Inclusive ICTs (G3ict), an international nonprofit with a history of leadership in digital inclusion and human rights, has convened in Mexico a team of global smart technology and inclusion experts to track the progress and measure the commitment to digital inclusion of the country’s two largest cities, Mexico City and Guadalajara.

The Smart City Digital Inclusion Maturity Model© tool helps cities evaluate the current state of ICT accessibility and inclusion of persons with disabilities in city digital and smart services. Focused on a broad range of functions important to all cities, such as communications, procurement, training, and technology standards, it defines key performance indicators and metrics to support advancing accessibility and digital inclusion in a Smart City context.

“In Guadalajara we are working to be an inclusive city. In the Government Innovation Department, we developed this objective through digital inclusion, promoting accessibility to information technologies, to contribute to the social and economic development of the city,” said Saúl Jiménez, Director of Governmental Innovation in Guadalajara. “Together with the G3ict organization and with HearColors we will work on an exchange of information, with the objective of detecting the areas of opportunity and best practices to implement in the Municipality, in order to continue on this route, where each and every person will have easy access to the contents generated on the sites of this Municipal Government.”

To deepen their partnership and collaboration, G3ict has signed a separate Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) with both Mexico City and Guadalajara. The agreements call for leveraging resources and expertise to support each city’s digital transformation initiatives and promote the increased accessibility of Information Communication and Telecommunications (ICT) technologies. G3ict President, Axel Leblois, signed the agreement with each city. Saul Eduardo Jimenez Camacho, Director of Governmental Innovation signed an agreement with G3ict on behalf of the city of Guadalajara and Jose Antonio Peña Merino, Director of the Digital Agency for Public Innovation, signed on behalf of Mexico City.

James Thurston, G3ict Vice President and Smart Cities for All Managing Director praised both cities for their commitment to using technology to benefit all people, including persons with disabilities. “It is fitting that G3ict’s first assessments of Smart Cities outside the United States are these two cities,” said Thurston. “Both Mexico City and Guadalajara are global cities that are taking important steps to be both smarter and more inclusive. G3ict and our Smart Cities for All global initiative want to support their efforts with our tools and resources.”

For this week’s assessments of Mexico City and Guadalajara, G3ict has partnered with HearColors, a Mexican accessibility consultancy, to convene a team of Smart City, disability, and technology experts from civil society and industry. Expert participants in the assessments will come from Illumina, a Mexico disability NGO, Microsoft, IBM, Moovit, and the Mexican Human Rights Commission. In each city, an expert team will meet with leadership and key personnel from numerous city departments to understand how effectively Mexico City and Guadalajara coordinate their digital inclusion and smart city efforts to create inclusive experiences for everyone.

Monica Duhem, HearColors CEO thanked G3ict for its interest in Mexico being the first country to be included in the Smart Cities for All program. “We are very pleased with the team that will help us work with Mexico City and Guadalajara to identify the challenges and opportunities both cities have to make sure that their digital solutions are accessible to all. We are sure this exercise will be a success and will bring direct benefits to people with disabilities”.

The result of this week’s engagements between G3ict and the cities of Guadalajara and Mexico City will be an assessment of each city’s efforts on digital inclusion and a roadmap for making greater progress.

“For the visually impaired sector, Information and Communication Technologies have become indispensable tools that promote our academic, labor and social development. We thank Mexico City and Guadalajara for their participation in the Smart Cities for All program, as through these initiatives we walk towards an increasingly inclusive and accessible world” said Salvador Ángeles, representative of Ilumina, Ceguera y Baja Visión.