(electronic music)
- [Narrator] Today, there are more devices connected
to the internet than there are humans.
- We're literally going to be connecting 500 billion things
between now and the end of 2030.
- [Narrator] And not just devices,
entire systems like advanced manufacturing, digitized ports,
autonomous vehicles, hybrid justice systems,
even natural resources can be digitized.
- It saves us time, it saves us fuel,
but the biggest thing is water.
- [Narrator] In other countries,
connecting people is a priority.
- Internet access should definitely be a human right.
- There's still 45% of the globe
that isn't able to connect to the internet.
One of our goals is to make sure
that that digital divide is closed.
We need to train contributors to the digital age
and create an inclusive future for all.
(gentle music)
- In Water District 63,
we supply a multitude of uses for the water.
The main use off the Boise River is still agriculture,
corn, sugar beets, carrot seed, and onions.
Oh, I forgot potatoes.
Holy cow. (laughing)
Our biggest crop in the state of Idaho is potatoes.
- [Interviewer] D-CAM speeds, A-CAM speeds?
- I'm Guy Diedrich.
I have the privilege of running a program
called Country Digital Acceleration, or CDA.
- [Narrator] CDA helps governments deliver
on their national digital agenda.
- Countries have to be prepared to digitize,
and that means to digitize their transportation,
digitize their factories, their homes.
Everything is going to be connected,
and so they take on a national digital agenda
to define their priorities.
Those things then become individual projects
that we can run a pilot against.
And then when the government sees that it works,
they now know that they can scale it up
and it's going to work.
- [Narrator] For one of those projects.
CDA paired with the Idaho Department of Water Resources
to tackle an all-too-common problem in America.
- The last three years we've had,
we've been in a pretty major drought.
Last year, we shut canals off
almost a month and a half early because we ran out of water.
- [Narrator] And those water shortages
have a major impact on farmers.
- So right now, natural flow coming into the system
is about 600 cubic feet per second.
Demand is about 1,000 CFS.
How do we split that water up fairly and equally
to everybody in the Treasure Valley?
If you have a water right, then you're entitled to it.
And what Water District 63 is, is the administrator of that.
- [Narrator] A lot of the infrastructure,
as well as manual data collection,
remained largely unchanged since the early 1900s.
- The only way to administer the water is to come
and collect flow data.
The problem we have is we drive out here once a week
for four seconds, check our data,
and we don't come back 'til the week after.
By installing automation and telemetry sites,
we get realtime, 24-hour data,
and gives water managers better information
to make decisions on their water usage.
(intriguing music)
We were approached by Cisco to partner in looking
for a project that high-speed wireless broadband
could integrate with water.
At first, I was a little skeptical
because I'm not a tech guy, I'm a water guy.
With this automation project, we can save anywhere
from 3,000 to 5,000 acre feet of water.
It's about one canal on for several weeks extra a year.
So it really does extend our season.
It really is a simple, cost-effective solution
to water management.
Partnering with Cisco and through the CDA
was really helpful, and Cisco introducing us to people
that could further the technology
and take us into the 21st century was amazing.
- You know, it's one thing to have a consulting firm
put together a PowerPoint, but that's not execution.
We'll put together a process to take that slide deck
and actually operationalize it.
- [Narrator] And CDA has taken on a lot of projects,
over 1400 to be precise, from the Golden Mile Project
in India, helping connect cities,
to a hospital in Oslo, diagnosing brain cancer in just days,
or a new way to help electric vehicles
prevent peak-use blackouts.
- We have 60,000 partner companies
in 48 countries around the world.
We find, across those countries, certain themes.
The first is healthcare.
The second one is education.
And the third one is security.
Some of the other areas that we see are
around transportation and smart and connected cities.
The one that's emerging is sustainability.
You're going to see a real commitment
to sustainability practices
because we're seeing it all over the world.
- [Narrator] Integrating smart digital technologies
to strategically address the challenges we are facing
is a united global effort.
- I think about digitization as sort of like a rocket ship.
All these connections, all of these new opportunities
are gonna take connected societies into the stratosphere.
The unconnected are gonna stay on the ground.
They deserve to be on that ship,
and that's what we intend to do through CDA.
- Communities that don't have internet today
are communities that are left behind.
When people are connected,
it creates more opportunities to survive.
And what we realize is that the majority
of the people reside in the townships and the rural areas.
90% of the households were not connected.
So how about we create a solution
so that they can be able to connect to wifi,
instead of them walking so many kilometers
to go to the town library.
- [Narrator] In order to do that,
Luvo would need some serious hardware.
- [Luvo] We tested out Cisco access points,
which gave us the depth so people were able to connect
in their shacks and in their homes within their communities.
- [Narrator] Along with connectivity,
upscaling the technology workforce is high
on South Africa's national digital agenda.
- We need to create a second layer leadership.
The only way we can do that is
by upscaling the next generation of engineers,
the next generation of managers,
which can also, at some point, build their own companies.
- You have to educate the population.
If you don't educate
simultaneously with your investments, you will fail.
Every single time we make technology investments,
that academic side goes right along with it.
- [Narrator] That's where Cisco's Edge Centers come in.
Since 2019, they've trained thousands
of people in South Africa.
(speaking in foreign language)
- We recently did a study
around the importance of digital skills,
and there is definitely a gap.
With partners such as Cisco,
with training and skills development,
particularly to ensure digital skills for local workers.
- We thought Cisco was just a routing and switching company,
up until we went into Cisco's program for 12 months,
which we were taught not only the technology,
but we were also taught sales and marketing.
If individuals in townships
and rural areas can take these opportunities,
they could literally change their lives.
- When I look into the future,
I see the center being just a hive of activity
with young people that are driven.
- We focus on the outcome.
It's not about the technology,
so much as it is delivering
on the outcome for that population.
- We are in the business of building both men and women
that will carry the future of this country forward
through technology and digitalization.