(Correspondent: Wang Tianjian) On April 27^th, the parallel session titled “Big Data in Support of Digital Economy” of the BRICS Forum on Big Data for Sustainable Development was successfully held online. The session was jointly hosted by China Association for Science and Technology, Tianjin Municipal People’s Government, Research Center for Digital Economy of Nankai University, and the Chinese Committee of the World Federation of Engineering Organization (WFEO-China).

The co-chairs of this session are Professor Gong Ke, Director-General of the Research Center for Digital Economy and Chairman of WFEO-China, and Professor Virgilio Almeida from Federal University of Minas Gerais, Brazil. A total of 8 experts and scholars from China, Brazil, Russia, India and UNCTAD (United Nations Conference on Trade and Development), including Wu Hequan, Academician of Chinese Academy of Engineering; Zhan Xiaoning, Director of Division on Investment and Enterprise of UNCTAD; Anna Serebryanikova, President of Big Data Association of Russia; Professor Anurag Agrawal from Ashoka University, India; Oleg I. Karasev, Vice-President of Lomonosov Moscow State University, Russia; Liu Gang, Chief Economist of Chinese Institute of New Generation Artificial Intelligence Development Strategies, delivered speeches in the session, sharing the policies and practices carried out in support of the development of digital economy in their countries as well as analyzing the problems encountered in this process. They also had in-depth discussions on how countries could collaborate to face challenges.

After the speeches, Professor Gong Ke made a summary for the session, pointing out that the experts’ insightful speeches from different aspects conveyed a common idea, which is that we should strengthen the cooperation among BRICS countries in the field of digital economy and facilitate the sustainable development of BRICS countries and the whole world.