Information and communication technology ministers of South Korea, Japan and China met for the first time in seven years in Tokyo to discuss ways to boost exchanges, officials said Monday.

The trilateral meeting was the sixth of its kind, after the last one held in Malaysia in 2011.

Since the creation of the ICT meeting among the three North East Asian countries in 2000, Korea has been seeking to hold the meeting annually, but Japan and China were not available for unknown reasons due to domestic situations, according to an official at the Korean Ministry of Science and ICT.

The three ICT ministers shared their policies on emerging technologies of the “fourth industrial revolution,” such as artificial intelligence, the fifth-generation network, the internet of things and big data, and agreed to cooperate on the development of the new technologies and utilization of related services. 

On commercialization of the 5G network, the three nations will work together on standardization and discovering new network services, according to the ministry.

The ministers also agreed to make efforts to reduce roaming fees to “reasonable levels” amid growing economic and cultural exchanges among the three countries.

“The ministers agreed that the three countries’ cooperation would contribute to sustainable development of the North East Asia region and help solve global problems,” the Korean ministry said.

At a sideline event arranged for meetings of ICT businesses of the three countries, Korean ICT Minister Yoo Young-min said, “We hope the participating companies will find new business opportunities through exchanges among the three countries, and lead development of technologies for innovation in the economy and society.”

By Song Su-hyun (song@heraldcorp.com)