The digital economy has become one of the highlighted fields for the G20 countries' development and has gradually grown into a strong force.

Leaders from the Group of 20 (G20) major economies will start a summit in India's capital of New Delhi on Saturday to try to find solutions to some of the world's pressing problems.

Prior to the summit, the Indian presidency for the Digital Economy Working Group selected three priority areas, including digital public infrastructure (DPI), security in digital economy and digital scaling, as key issues at the G20 Digital Economy Ministers meeting last month.

The bloc currently accounts for 80 percent of global gross domestic production (GDP) and 75 percent of international trade. Its members include Argentina, Australia, Brazil, Canada, China, France, Germany, India, Indonesia, Italy, Japan, South Korea, Mexico, Russia, Saudi Arabia, South Africa, Turkey, the United Kingdom, the United States and the European Union.

A continued effort

The G20 nations have focused on the digital economy for years. When hosting the G20 Hangzhou Summit in 2016, China included the digital economy in the G20 agenda for the first time and called for finding innovative ways for development and forging new growth drivers.

The initiative adopted by G20 countries proposed some common understanding, principles and key areas of development and cooperation for the digital economy.

In 2017, the group adopted the Roadmap for Digitalization to further extend its solid structure to achieve the vision, stressing several goals, including improving worldwide access to and effective use of digital technologies, expanding digital infrastructure, encouraging continued advance in IoT, strengthening trust in the digital economy and advocating online consumer protection.

As AI technologies started coming strong as an emerging but revolutionary technology, the G20 nations welcomed the G20 AI Principles in 2019 to enable the member nations to better cooperate on such fast-moving technology.

During the three-year pandemic, all the institutions and companies have been forced to shift to digital mode at a swift pace, where people had to learn how to work and socialize remotely online via the internet with the help of technologies such as AI and the cloud. The G20 nations deliberated on multiple issues on how digitalization empowered business, education and health in a difficult time.

In addition, G20 nations have made efforts to bridge the digital divides experienced by people living in different regions, as reliable connectivity is fundamental for the digital transformation.

A worldwide action

The international community is making various efforts to develop the digital economy.

Europe has set a slew of targets for 2032 to unlock its digital potential, including 20 million ICT specialists, at least 80 percent of the population mastering basic digital skills and 75 percent of EU companies using cloud services. The plan could unlock an extra €2.8 trillion (22 trillion yuan) in gross value added, equivalent to nearly 21 percent of the EU's current economy, according to Politico.

India launched the Digital India initiative in 2015 for digital transformation. About 850 million internet users in India are experiencing some of the cheapest data costs in the world. Their mobile payment systems have supported 45 percent of the global payments in real time, which take place in India.

China proposed the G20 Action Plan on Digital Innovation and Cooperation last year, which is aimed at promoting the innovative application of digital technology, making innovation outcomes beneficial to all and shared by all, and welcoming the participation of all parties.

As of July, China built a total of 3.055 million 5G base stations, accounting for 26.9 percent of the country's total number of mobile base stations, according to a report released by the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology. It also rolled out a new plan in June to promote the integration, innovation and development of "5G+Industrial Internet", including helping over 3,000 enterprises build 5G factories and construct no less than 300 5G factories. In addition, China's internet users exceeded 1.01 billion by June, with internet penetration rising to 71.6 percent. All the development is paving the way for the country to build momentum for digital transformation with an expanding market.

In 2021, China's digital economy stood at 45.5 trillion yuan ($6.5 trillion), ranking second in the world. Emerging technologies such as artificial intelligence, cloud computing, big data, blockchain and quantum information are among the world's top tier, according to a report by the Internet Society of China on Tuesday.

A promising prospect

Ministers of the G20 made groundbreaking progress on how to effectively shape the digital public infrastructure of the future in a meeting last month in Bengaluru, India. The historical move helped the member countries collectively adopt a description of digital public infrastructure for the first time, agreeing to a set of principles that the shared digital systems should be secure and interoperable. The ministers also reached a consensus that such infrastructures can be built on open standards and promote access to services for all.

The meeting also recognized the importance of security as digital technologies have made inroads into critical sectors including health, finance, education, manufacturing and public services. The group vows to build up safety, resilience and trust in the digital economy.

The group also agreed to bridge the digital skill gaps among societies, economies and the workforce, as such gaps can be disruptive for the digital economy and result in increasing digital divides, particularly for women and girls.