President to attend COTEC summit on AI in Italy

Portugal’s president, António José Seguro, will travel to Venice, Italy, between Tuesday and Wednesday this week to take part in the 19th meeting of the business organisation COTEC Europe, which this year is dedicated to Artificial Intelligence (AI).

In his first appearance at a COTEC Europa summit – an organisation that brings together members of the COTEC business associations from Italy, Spain and Portugal annually, and which is meeting this year on the island of San Giorgio Maggiore in Venice – António José Seguro will address the closing session on Wednesday, alongside his Italian counterpart, Sergio Mattarella, and King Felipe VI of Spain.

Following last year’s meeting, held in Coimbra, this year’s edition of the symposium is dedicated to the theme “Rethinking work in the age of AI: Transformation, Opportunity, Governance”.

The objective is for the three nations to agree strategies to govern the integration of AI ‘ethically, effectively and sustainably’.

“In recent years, it has become clear that artificial intelligence is not only a rapidly evolving cutting-edge technology, but also a disruptive paradigm that compels businesses and public administrations to rethink the world of work, the synergies between human capital and digital technologies, staff training, the management of organisational and production processes and, ultimately, social relations,” say organisers.

Since taking office as head of state last March, António José Seguro has held institutional meetings with King Felipe VI and Sergio Mattarella — the Spanish monarch even travelled to Lisbon to attend the president’s inauguration ceremony, and Seguro travelled to Madrid the following month on his first official visit abroad, having been received by his Italian counterpart in May during a trip to Rome.

Source: LUSA

Natasha Donn

Journalist for the Portugal Resident.