THE PROBLEM
"Physical infrastructure takes a long time to build, is highly costly, and has low return on investment and economic growth."
Physical infrastructure provides high levels of employment and provides the physical means to boost trade and transport, which results in faster opening of intra-national and international markets and drives greater levels of efficiency.
The key problem, of course, is that physical infrastructure takes a long time to build and is highly costly while its return on investment (ROI) rates are low. With that, it is often left up to the governments to fund and build these projects, but governments around the world are struggling with financial deficits and the ability to fund the USD 70 trillion required over the next decade to meet the world’s infrastructure needs.
THE SOLUTION
“Deployment of digital Soft Infrastructure provided through the Multi-Dimensional Digital Economy Application system (MDDEAS), will optimize current physical infrastructure, prioritize investments and maximize investors' returns.”
Where do we start when prioritizing infrastructure investments? We must start with digital Soft Infrastructure which has been proven to trigger economic growth. For example, Indonesia, which was once behind the world in telecommunications, significantly grew its local economy by better connecting with their trade partners after rapidly deploying cellular technology. Such a move saw Indonesia leap-frog the USA in terms of communications capability since U.S. systems were burdened by legacy investments in analog switches and copper wires.
Soft infrastructure will provide a self-monitored National Trade Visibility dashboard to ensure the dynamic transparency of real-time trade information for public and private stakeholders. This allows the opportunity to optimize present and prioritize future physical infrastructure investments.
THE BENEFITS
"Digital soft infrastructure will minimize standardization. leading to point-to-world integration in a non-intrusive manner and resulting in a new dimension of global data delivered through a global business model sustained by a new USD 6 trillion service market opportunity, thus providing benefits to all."
According to the World Bank’s Logistics Performance Index, Singapore and Germany rank among the world’s top five countries in trade efficiency.
But why are these two countries so successful given the sizable investments of other countries?
The secret behind their success is the use of digital soft infrastructure coupled with physical infrastructure in order to increase trade efficiency, reduce trade costs, increase competitiveness and grow trade. Therefore, the use of digital Soft Infrastructure in trade is essential to optimize economic growth.