August 6, 2021 Results of G20 Digital Ministerial Meeting

On August 5, 2021, the G20 Digital Ministerial Meeting was held in Trieste, Italy, and Mr. TAKEDA Ryota, Minister for Internal Affairs and Communications, attended the meeting. The meeting was attended by digital ministers and other high-level representatives of the G20 member countries and regions as well as invited countries and relevant international organizations, and discussed promotion of digitalization of economy and whole society towards robust and sustainable recovery from the pandemic and adopted the Declaration of the G20 Digital Ministers.

1. Date of the meeting

Thursday, August 5, 2021 ※In the form of a hybrid conference

2. Outline of the event

Digitalization has a wide-ranging and significant impact on the economy and society, and a broader range of new policy issues are being recognized. The G20 Digital Ministerial Meeting was established in 2017 to promote policy discussions in the field of digital economy. In 2019, Japan hosted the G20 Ibaraki-Tsukuba Ministerial Meeting on Trade and Digital Economy. Since the 2020 meeting was held in the form of a video conference, this was the first in-person G20 ministerial meeting on digital economy in two years.
Mr. TAKEDA attended the sessions and made the following remarks.

• In order to promote socio-economic digitization, it is important to simultaneously promote the development and deployment of digital technologies and the expansion and advancement of broadband infrastructure.
• Concerning the development and utilization of AI, it is important to continue promoting the implementation of the G20 AI Principles, which are based on the human-centered approach agreed upon at the 2019 G20, under Japan’s Presidency .
• It is essential to promote Data Free Flow with Trust (DFFT), which aims to further facilitate free flow of data across borders by addressing issues related to reliability, and to achieve a robust and sustainable economic recovery and growth from COVID-19.
• Japan will further accelerate its efforts to provide e-government services so that the benefits of digitization can be permeated across the society as a whole. Japan is establishing Digital Agency under the Prime Minister’s direct control in September of this year to serve as the government-wide control tower for digital transformation.

As a result of this meeting, the Declaration of the G20 Digital Ministers was adopted.

3．Main points of the Declaration of the Digital Ministers

Under the overall theme of “Leveraging Digitalisation for a Resilient, Strong, Sustainable and Inclusive Recovery,” the following topics related to the digital economy and digital government were discussed. The importance and challenges of each were shared.

1. Digital economy

• Digital Transformation in Production for Sustainable Growth
• Leveraging Trustworthy Artificial Intelligence for MSMEs’ Inclusiveness and Start-ups’ Promotion
• Measurement, Practice and Impact of the Digital Economy
• Consumers’ Awareness and Protection in the Global Digital Economy
• Children Protection and Empowerment in the Digital Environment
• Encourage Innovation for Smart Cities and Communities
• Connectivity and Social Inclusion
• Data Free Flow with Trust and Cross-border Data Flows

2. Digital government

• Digital Tools for Public Services and Their Continuity
• Digital Identity
• Agile Regulation