Bilans d’évènement
Exceptional visit of Monaco in Korea: a rich program of high-level institutional meetings.
The French-Korean Chamber of Commerce and Industry has been pleased to welcome in Korea a delegation of 25 political and economic actors from Monaco.
Monaco government, Monaco Economic Board, Visit Monaco and company CEOs from all sectors (cosmetics, construction, insurance, law…) discovered the Korean market and digital innovation landscape to find business opportunities in South Korea. This is the first time Monaco City-State mobilizes such a large economic delegation abroad. They chose Korea as it is one of the most innovative countries in the world (4.55 of R&D expenditures as a percentage of GDP). They stayed for a full 4 days program organized by FKCCI and are eager to cooperate with the Peninsula’s companies and institutions.
At this occasion, the French-Korean Chamber of Commerce and Industry organized several high-level political meetings between Monaco and Korean dignitaries in all layers of institutions from national, executive, legislative bodies to local governments.
On December 5th, Ban-Ki-Moon, former UN Secretary General for 10 years, shared his vision of Korean geopolitics and international relations in the North-East Asia. He also tackled the topic of digital transition and government’s roles in accompanying this transformation that affects all layers of society and fuels change of the economic model. For the former UN Secretary General, making innovation in science & technology inclusive and ethical is key for the future.
Monaco has been implementing an ambitious and voluntarist digital transition policy, which has been the main focus of the delegation’s visit. On December 4th, the issues of the 4th Industrial Revolution were covered during a meeting between Frédéric Genta, Delegate for Digital Affairs and Member of the Government of Monaco, and Young-Jin Choi, Secretary General of the Korean Presidential Committee on the 4th IR. This committee aims at gathering several ministry officials and private company stakeholders to analyze and formulate policy recommendations on the direction of the 4th IR directly to the Blue House.
On Dec 5th, Mr Genta met with MOLIT (Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport) Vice-Minister Choong Hwan Ahn to share thoughts on smart city policies
On the theme of E-health and the future of healthcare, Mr Genta also met with Deputy Se-Yeon Kim, head of the National Assembly Committee on Healthcare. For the Deputy, innovation in the health sector has become one of the key growth engines in Korea.
Beside the innovation landscape of both countries, the investment ecosystems were another important topic the mission. On December 4th, Monaco delegation (composed of Mr Genta, Guillaume Rose, Chief Executive Officer - Monaco Economic Board (MEB) and Diego Bonaventura, Director of Monaco Chamber of Commerce – accompanied by Cédric Legrand, General Director of FKCCI, met with the head of Invest Korea, Shawn Chang, the investment branch of KOTRA. In 2018, Korea attracted 26.9 bn USD of FDI, a 17,2% increase from a year before, and continues to make efforts to facilitates conditions for foreign investments. Invest Korea and its counterpart Monaco Economic Board could exchange on future opportunities on further investments between the two countries. For Mr. Genta, as the Principality does not have the size to foster its own international tech champions, it should be considered as a showroom and funding nation for displaying cutting edge technologies through partnerships with large corporations. For example, in May 2019, the City-State launched 5G in the framework of a cooperation with Huawei. Monaco also selected Amazon Web Services as a cloud service provider. The cloud will make it possible to implement and accelerate public initiatives such as e-government, mobility, education and healthcare. The Principality is now ready to move a step further and invite Korean partners to test and launch new services.
Finally, the delegation visited local Korean governments to exchange best practices and identify topics of collaboration. On Dec. 5th, the delegation met Byoung-Yoon You, Vice-Commissionner of Incheon Free Economic Zone (IFEZ), who presented IFEZ smart city project, a world reference for integrated services applied in the urban context.
On Dec. 6th, during meetings with Sohyun Park, President of AURI (Architectural and Urban Research Institute), and Cho Sang-Ho, Deputy Mayor of Sejong City, one of the main Korean national pilot smart city projects, participants could share thoughts on their smart city projects. Since last year, the Principality has launched the policy dubbed “Extended Monaco”, a unique smart city model to combine the best that digital technology can offer and to apply it simultaneously to all of its public policies and its economy, with three priorities in mind: enhancing an already exceptional quality of life, inaugurating a new cycle of economic prosperity and boosting the value of the civil service.
