A few days ago a news appeared on the Italian foreign office website, www.esteri.it. It might be an important one for the future of African countries.
“E-governance for development” – is written in a press release – “is the new Italian initiative to promote and strengthen, among the activities of the Italian presidency of the G8, cooperation and partnership with the developing countries in the fields of innovation and best practices based on ICT for “public governance”.
The initiative will initially be funded by the Italian Cooperation with 20 million euros. The goal is ambitious: overcoming the “digital divide“.
The objective of the “e-governance for development” is to promote, through the use of ICT programs of reform, modernisation and institutional building of the public sector, digitisation projects of public services, initiatives to improve democratic processes.
These are the characteristics:
- A more ‘close coordination between the Unita’ for e-Government and innovation for the development of the Innovation and Technology Department and the Italian Cooperation, which will form ‘the nucleus of a Hub and Spoke aimed to involve and in aggregate systemic way other public and private actors;
- An expansion of operations to include over a draft e-Government initiatives to improve the democratic and participatory processes (e-governance);
- A concentration of operations in areas of excellence for Italian made available to developing countries and countries emerging best practices Ict;
- A gradual shift from pilot projects to significant programs to be implemented in synergy with international organizations;
- Involvement of foundations and private sponsors to catalyze additional resources.
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