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Saudi Cities Rank High On IMD Arab SCI 2023 | |
| Sumita Pawar |
Four cities in Saudi Arabia—Riyadh, Makkah, Jeddah, and Madinah—have ranked highly in the IMD Smart City Index (SCI) list for 2023, according to SPA.
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Report says the Saudi capital maintained its position as the 3rd Arab city in the IMD Smart City Index (SCI) 2023, which saw for the first time the cities of Makkah, Jeddah, and Madinah included in the observatory, ranking 4th, 5th, and 7th, respectively.
At the global level, Riyadh, Makkah, Jeddah, and Madinah have ranked 30th, 52nd, 56th, and 85th, respectively, out of the 141 cities included in the Smart City Observatory, which seeks to find out how technology is enabling cities to achieve a higher quality of life for their inhabitants, it added.
The SPA report said that this year's IMD index focused on how well people understand how the smart technology systems their cities use to make their lives better affect them and how well they balance the economic, technological, and humanitarian factors.
According to the report, the Smart City Observatory is one of the global indices that evaluates the preparedness of cities, and it is an assessment tool and holistic, interdisciplinary approach for urban planners, decision-makers, and researchers to evaluate smart tech systems’ contributions to improving the living standards of residents.
The improvement in the Saudi cities’ ranking in the Smart City Index was the result of the collaborative efforts of all concerned agencies, including the National Smart City Platform, launched by the Saudi Data and Artificial Intelligence Authority (SDAIA), it added.