Underlying disparities had adverse impact across world during Covid-19 crisis: KTR

IT and Industries Minister KT Rama Rao termed the global health risk like COVID-19 as a crack which should be an eye-opener for governments and multilateral organisations across the world

Hyderabad: The Covid- 19 crisis had a disproportionate impact on certain groups and countries because of the disparities in healthcare, education, financial stability and technology, the IT and Industries Minister KT Rama Rao observed here on Friday. He emphasised the need for a holistic and systems-based view to identify hidden cracks and build resilience to face future shocks. He termed the global health risk like COVID-19 as a crack which should be an eye-opener for governments and multilateral organisations across the world.

Rama Rao was addressing a virtual panel discussion organised by the World Economic Forum on ‘Harnessing Emerging Technologies in India’ on Friday. Other panelists in the session moderated by Diksha Madhok include Sequioa Capital managing director Rajan Anandan, Barefoot College International director Meagan Fallone and UPL Limited global CEO Jai Shroff. The panelists deliberated on the topic ‘How can emerging technologies further boost productivity, expedite the growth transition and reinforce resilience to future shocks to meet India’s pressing challenges?’

Speaking on the occasion, the Minister informed that Telangana State has been investing largely in improving digital infrastructure via the T-Fiber project. “Due to the vast and broad spectrum of economic, social and geographical scenarios found in India, our country is well-positioned to act as a global test bed for building emerging technology-based solutions, which can be readily scaled across third world countries to achieve sustainable development goals,” he said.

Further, the Minister opined that the digital readiness has been instrumental for a V-shaped economic recovery during the Covid pandemic. “Conventional businesses rapidly went online across the country – leveraging improving internet accessibility. Internet has enabled access to new markets helping first movers to not only recover but thrive during the pandemic,” he added.

Rama Rao explained that the State government had formulated actionable technology policy frameworks for the State in emerging technology areas such as Blockchain, Drones, Artificial Intelligence, Open Data, Cyber Security, and Cloud. He also spoke about the measures initiated by the State government to leverage innovation and emerging technologies in various sectors like agriculture, healthcare and education. He gave an overview of the various multi-stakeholder initiatives like Artificial Intelligence for Agriculture and Medicines from the Sky.

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