The Diplomat
Spain, the United States and the United Kingdom have joined forces to launch the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) Global Technology Forum, which aims to establish a fixed venue for dialogue on the opportunities and risks of new technology.
The initiative was advanced last September by the United States and the United Kingdom, but has not become effective until now, at which time Spain has been attached coinciding with the presidency of the Ministerial Conference, as reported in a press release by the State Secretary for Digitalization and Artificial Intelligence, attached to the Ministry of Economic Affairs and Digital Transformation.
“The world needs this Forum,” said the State Secretary for Digitalization and Artificial Intelligence, Carme Artigas, during the presentation of the forum, which took place in mid-December during the OECD Ministerial Conference on Digital Economy, held in Gran Canaria. “There is still no international organization or entity that considers the implementation of certain emerging technologies throughout society,” she added.
Apart from Artigas, also participating in the presentation were OECD Deputy Secretary-General Ulrik Vestergaard; UK Director General for Digital Economy Susannah Storey; and U.S. Ambassador for Cybersecurity and Digital Policy Nathaniel Flick.
The Global Forum on Technology will follow the standards and development of all OECD Global Forums, while building on and adding to other international efforts, such as the Future Technology Forum, which the UK organized during its G7 presidency, or the recent OECD Digital Economy summit. The aim of all this deployment is to draw up a common roadmap that explores the economic and social opportunities of the digital transition, while analyzing its impact on a large scale and making decisions accordingly.
With a view to its future activities, the project will operate at two levels: one with experts, representatives of economic activity and civil society; and another at the highest ministerial or governmental level, with meetings every two years to advance global governance for digital transformation.
According to the State Secretary, Spain’s interests include the deployment of neurotechnology and quantum computing. The former is included in the National Artificial Intelligence Strategy, to which the Recovery, Transformation and Resilience Plan devotes 600 million euros up to 2023, and includes projects such as the pioneering National Neurotechnology Center, based on the campus of the Autonomous University of Madrid. For its part, the Quantum Spain program, which aims to create a quantum computing ecosystem and contemplates a total investment of 60 million euros, has led to Spain being selected to host one of the first European quantum computers.
