Digital ministers' meeting D16 to take place at SCCON.

To advance digitalization in the states and municipalities, a closing of ranks is necessary. Finding synergies and using them in matters of digitization is a core topic of the D16 - and where better to achieve this than at the Smart Country Convention? The first D16 meeting under the joint presidency of Berlin and Brandenburg will therefore take place on November 8 and 9, 2023, in part as part of the leading event for the digitization of the public sector. "The fact that the D16s are coming to us is, in addition to the presence at the federal political level, another strong sign that the country's digitization has become the focus of attention," says Jusuf Hadziselimovic, project manager of the Smart Country Convention.

Thematically, SCCON has focused on the digitalization of administration and the development of smart cities and regions since its launch, but also combines congress, workshops, expo and networking as a format at the same time. The focus is on the exchange of all participants and learning from each other.

"We are pleased that we as the state of Berlin are now able to take over the chairmanship together with Brandenburg for 18 months. We want to use our chairmanship to jointly drive digitization for our entire capital region!" explains Martina Klement, State Secretary for Digitization and Administrative Modernization at the Berlin Senate Chancellery and Chief Digital Officer of Berlin. Martina Klement will also speak at the Smart Country Convention.

"In particular, we want to look at existing solution approaches and enter into a conversation with the other countries. It is important for us to learn about their experiences - whether in rural or urban areas - and what we can learn from them," says Dr. Benjamin Grimm, State Secretary in the Brandenburg State Chancellery and Commissioner for Digitalization. The goal of the joint chairmanship is to strengthen cross-state cooperation through professional exchange and to advance joint projects with concrete resolutions.

About the D16

Within the framework of the D16, the digital officers of the federal states have been meeting since 2019 to discuss the opportunities and challenges of the digital transformation across the federal states. In spring 2024, the digital ministers' meeting is to be established as an independent digital ministers' conference and thus further formalized. On June 19, 2019, the first meeting of the digital coordinators of the federal states took place in Potsdam. The aim of the meeting was to enable an exchange of experience between the states on digital policy issues. The chairmanship of the D16 rotates annually. In July 2023, two states will assume this role together for the first time: Berlin and Brandenburg will co-chair the D16 until the end of 2024 and organize the D16 meetings in close cooperation.