Stresses on need to expand benefits of digital technology across the globe
New Delhi: India’s G20 presidency will be inclusive, ambitious, decisive, and action-oriented, Prime Minister Narendra Modi said on Wednesday.
Speaking during the closing session of the G20 Summit in Bali, the Prime Minister said: “India is taking charge of the G20 at a time when the world is simultaneously grappling with geopolitical tensions, economic slowdown, rising food and energy prices, and the long-term ill-effects of the (Covid) pandemic. At such a time, the world is looking at the G20 with hope.
“Today, I want to assure that India’s G20 presidency will be inclusive, ambitious, decisive, and action-oriented.”
He further said that in the next one year of India’s presidency of the G20, it would be ensured that the forum acts as a global prime mover to envision new ideas and accelerate collective action.
“The sense of ownership over natural resources is giving rise to conflict today, and has become the main cause of the plight of the environment. For the safe future of the planet, the sense of trusteeship is the solution.
“LiFE i.e. ‘Lifestyle for Environment’ campaign can make a big contribution to this. Its purpose is to make sustainable lifestyles a mass movement,” he told the gathering of world leaders on the last day of the summit.
India will assume the G20 presidency from Indonesia on December 1, 2022, which will continue till November 20, 2023.
The Prime Minister further said that “without peace and security, our future generations will not be able to take advantage of economic growth or technological innovation.
“The G20 has to convey a strong message in favour of peace and harmony. All these priorities are fully embodied in the theme of India’s G20 Chairmanship — ‘One Earth, One Family, One Future’.”
‘Need to expand benefits of digital technology across the globe’
Earlier while addressing a session on digital transformation , Prime Minister Modi said that the proper use of digital technologies can become a force multiplier in the decades-long global fight against poverty.
Underlining the need for expanding the benefits of digital technology across the world, PM Modi said that during India’s presidency of the G20 — which will commence from December 1 — it will work jointly with G20 partners towards achieving this objective.
Citing the benefits of digital technology during the Covid-19 pandemic, Modi said: “Digital solutions can also be helpful in the fight against climate change, as we all saw in the examples of remote-working and paperless green offices during Covid.
“But these benefits will be realised only when the digital access is truly inclusive and when the use of digital technology is really widespread.”
He however noted that it is the responsibility of all G20 leaders to ensure that the benefits of digital transformation should not be confined to a small part of the human race.
Here the Prime Minister shared India’s experience of the past few years of making digital architecture inclusive and how it has brought about a socio-economic transformation.
“Digital use can bring scale and speed. Transparency can be brought in governance. India has developed digital public goods whose basic architecture has in-built democratic principles,” Modi told the gathering of world leaders.
He further said that India has made digital access public, but noted that at the international level, there is still a huge digital divide as citizens of most developing countries of the world do not have any kind of digital identity.
“Only 50 countries have digital payment systems. Can we take a pledge together that in the next 10 years we will bring digital transformation in the life of every human being, so that no person in the world will be deprived of the benefits of digital technology,” the Prime Minister added.
