The Youth and Digital Future Forum of the 2023 World Internet Conference (WIC) Wuzhen Summit was held on Nov 9, in Wuzhen, East China’s Zhejiang province.

Themed on “Improvement, Involvement, Influence”, the forum invited representatives, including heads of international organizations and the first group of youth leaders under the Global Youth Leadership Program (GYLP), to have discussions on missions of global youth in promoting digital development.

Francis Gurry, vice-chair of the WIC, said in his address that the forum gathered youth leaders worldwide to promote dialogues among internet professionals of different generations.

Ren Xianliang, secretary general of the WIC, called on young people to become groundbreakers for technological innovation, drivers of digital development and practitioners of global exchanges and mutual learning.

Chen Jinbiao, vice-chairman of the Standing Committee of the Zhejiang Provincial People's Congress and secretary of the leading Party members group of the committee, said that the forum plays an active role in enabling youth to express ideas, promoting youth participation and addressing their needs.

Via video link, Cosmas Luckyson Zavazava, director of the International Telecommunication Union (ITU) Telecommunication Development Bureau, appealed to youth leaders to actively improve, participate in and influence digital transformation.

In their keynote speeches, Nahima Diaz, director of the Nicaraguan Institute of Telecommunications and Postal Services, David Kanamugire, chief executive officer of Rwanda National Cyber Security Agency, and Rafael Evangelista, board member of Brazilian Steering Internet Committee, shared the practices and experience of facilitating young generation to promote digital transformation in their countries.

Representatives of global youth leaders from China, Brazil, and the US shared their insights on the application of artificial intelligence (AI) technology in the digital transformation of specialized areas of the mobile internet, the mutual promotion of youth and AI development, next-generation internet development and internet governance from the perspective of technology, innovative cooperation of technology and digital education, the development of Chinese and global digitalization, and technology empowering the hearing-impaired.

Chon Kil-nam, father of internet in South Korea and honorary professor at the Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology, also a member of the first leading group of the Internet Governance Forum, and Xue Lan, a senior liberal arts professor and dean of Schwarzman College at Tsinghua University, held a cross-generation dialogue with representatives of youth leaders from Canada, Argentina, Azerbaijan, and Malaysia. The youth representatives shared their experiences in AI, global internet governance, the promotion of technology, and technology empowering vulnerable groups. They consulted and exchanged ideas with the experts, sharing their common understanding of and expectations for current digital development.

Representatives from China, Ghana, Nepal, Bahrain, and Rwanda shared their practices in digital infrastructure building, remote healthcare, the Internet of Things and the information and communications technology, and technology promoting equal education.

Prior to the event, Zhuang Rongwen, chair of the WIC, together with Gurry, presented certificates to the first group of youth leaders under the GYLP, during the plenary meeting of the 2023 WIC Wuzhen Summit on Nov 8.

The forum was jointly hosted by the WIC and the ITU, and co-organized by the Fuxi Institution.