Director for IT and eGovernment, Mihailo Jovanović, at the opening of the Serbian-Chinese Business Forum in Shanghai, signed a Memorandum of Understanding for the establishment of a national platform for the development of artificial intelligence with the Director of Huawei in Serbia, Li Mengqun.
The memorandum was signed during the visit of the Government of the Republic of Serbia to the People’s Republic of China, and the signing was attended by the Prime Minister of the Republic of Serbia, Ana Brnabić, as well as the ministers who are members of the Serbian delegation.
“Today, I had the honour of taking the first major step in establishing the national platform for artificial intelligence – the state-of-the-art high-performance computer systems shall be housed in the State Data Center in Kragujevac, as soon as it opens, together with the Huawei artificial intelligence software platform. These systems will enable the development of the state-of-the-art eGovernment services based on the use of artificial intelligence, in accordance with the Strategy of the Republic of Serbia for the Development of Artificial Intelligence by 2025, which is currently being drafted, as well as further development of education, research, innovation, science and economy”, Mihailo Jovanović said.
The artificial intelligence development platform is part of a $13 million grant awarded by the China International Cooperation Development Agency, and under this grant, Huawei will provide cloud infrastructure as well as an artificial intelligence platform to be housed at the State Data Center in Kragujevac.
The Government of Serbia has formed a Working Group for drafting of the Strategy for the Development of Artificial Intelligence of the Republic of Serbia for the period 2020 – 2025, which will make Serbia one of the first Southeast European countries to have such a strategy. The task of the Working Group is to develop the Draft Strategy for the Development of Artificial Intelligence of the Republic of Serbia for the period 2020 – 2025, which will include priority policies with an emphasis on the development of artificial intelligence in education, research, innovation, public administration and the economy. At this stage of developing a strategic framework for the development of artificial intelligence, based on the results of the consultations carried out so far and the performed analyses, it has been identified that there is a need to formulate the measures for achieving the following objectives: development of education directed towards the needs of modern society and the economy conditioned by the advancement of artificial intelligence, development of science and innovation in the field of artificial intelligence and its applications, development of the economy based on artificial intelligence, improvement of conditions for the development of artificial intelligence, improvement of public sector services through the application of artificial intelligence, as well as measures to ensure its ethical and safe application.
The political relations between Serbia and the People’s Republic of China are at the highest level. The two countries are linked by the strategic partnership and sincere friendship while working together to develop artificial intelligence is just one of the successful projects of Serbia and China.