Digital tech powers Shenzhen growth

Intelligent e-govt services helping South China hub provide essential medical services, assist businesses with economic revival measures

Shenzhen's intelligent e-government services have played an integral role in the fight against the COVID-19 onslaught and have become a unique advantage for its business environment.

It opened an emergency self-declaration system in early February and more than 20 million users have uploaded their health statuses so far. Its novel health quick response code has become an essential tool to guarantee safety for individuals traveling around the city in Guangdong province.

It also launched tracing maps of confirmed infected patients, infrared readouts that track people movements, 24-hour online medical consultations and a designated section to assist firms with business recovery strategies on an official mobile app－i-Shenzhen.

The digital platform was able to be set up within a limited time due to the technology hub's unique model of modern government services it has established in recent years.

The app boasts more than 7,000 types of services offered by municipal departments and district governments. It has so far recorded about 14 million downloads and more than 6 million registered users.

The app also features 15 digital licenses and certificates, including identification cards and social security cards, and personal information is protected through blockchain technology.

These services are not simply moved from offline to online, but also digitalized in order to speed up application approval efficiency. Its cutting edge e-government services platform supports about 200 projects that can be approved online in just one second, which means citizens can get virtually immediate confirmation.

"Individual industrial and commercial household registrations used to take about two to three working days, and agency fees were around 500 yuan ($71.94) if needed," said Ou Xiqin, a citizen who successfully received his license through Shenzhen's e-government platform.

"But this time it took me about 15 minutes to fill in the information. Two minutes later, I received a confirmation text message and the license was ready for downloading and printing," Ou said.