Lviv, 18-19 November 2010: At present, local self-government bodies are at the initial stage of introducing e-governance. Automation of document flow is introduced in some city councils. Therefore, to share best practices of local self-government bodies using information and communication technologies, Lviv City Council and UNDP organised a Forum "Electronic Governance - Effective Governance for Residents”. The Forum was held under financial support of the Canadian International Development Agency.
Ukraine is on the 54th place according to e-governance development index published in the UN E-governance Report 2010. This index assesses the readiness and willingness of 184 countries to use the Internet and mobile technologies to perform governmental functions. Implementation of e-governance in local self-government bodies in Ukraine is at the initial stage, which means unilateral placement on the information at official website of the city councils.
Forum “Electronic Governance - Effective Governance for Residents” is aimed at sharing best practices of the city councils in introducing electronic document flow, internal portals, providing electronic services and establishing and maintaining official interactive web pages. The Forum was organised by the Lviv City Council with support from UN Development Programme. Since 2006, Lviv became one of 29 partner-municipalities of the UNDP Project "Municipal Governance and Sustainable Development Programme". Lviv local authorities have initiated the Forum and present the official web site of the City Council, an internal portal and electronic document flow. The participants of the Forum included more than 96 participants representing almost 40 city councils, representativesof the Ministry of Regional Development and Construction of Ukraine, Ukrainian and international experts and representatives of IT companies.
Opening the Forum, Oksana Remiga, UNDP Senior Programme Manager said: "Introduction of e-government helps Ukraine to achieve high quality of life of European developed countries”.
According to Lviv City Mayor Andriy Sadovyi: " Lviv has good achievements in the field of e-governance, but for us experience of other cities is very important, we must adopt the best. Our residents should receive basic information over the Internet, and only complex cases will require visit to local self-government offices. I have high expectations for this Forum, because the consolidated position of all municipalities can provide a serious impetus for the development of e-government in Ukraine ".
According to Lviv City Mayor Andriy Sadovyi: " Lviv has good achievements in the field of e-governance, but for us experience of other cities is very important, we must adopt the best. Our residents should receive basic information over the Internet, and only complex cases will require visit to local self-government offices. I have high expectations for this Forum, because the consolidated position of all municipalities can provide a serious impetus for the development of e-government in Ukraine ".
Igor Koliushko, DirectoroftheCenterforPolicy andLegalReformsintroducedtheprospectsofe-governmentinUkraineanddescribedthekeyissuesthathindertheestablishmentofe-governanceinlocalself-government bodies. These problems are the lack of strategic documents (Concept, Strategy and programs for the Information Society and e-governance development, basic laws “On electronic commerce”, “On electronic information system "Electronic Government", "On Administrative Services”), the lack of integrated information resources and information interaction of state and local government bodies etc.
Anders Nord, Senior Officer on Finance and Governance of Swedish Associations of Local Authorities and Regions (SALAR) presented the experience of Swedish municipalities in introduction of e-governance. The expert noted that e-governance and e-services should be simple for users, reduce costs of companies and citizens, improve service quality and their availability, increase cooperation, including cooperation of government agencies and municipalities.
Forumparticipantssharedexperiencesinimplementingelectronicdocument flow, whichaimstoautomaterequestsfromcitizens,controlovertheexecutionofdocuments, theeffectivedraftingofdocumentsanddigitalarchivedocuments. In this section representatives of Ukrainka, Berdyansk and Kharkiv presented their experience.
Municipalities of Lviv and Kryvyi Rig shared experience in creating and maintaining the official websites of the city councils. Anatoly Kovtonyuk, expert trainer of educational programs INTEL “Education for the Future" summarized the experience of UNDP Project "Municipal Governance and Sustainable Development Programme" in support of a creation of 17 official websites of partner city councils.
Lviv and Vinnitsa City Council presented the internal portals, which main purpose is to organise information flows in municipal councils and increase efficiency of personnel.
In the section devoted to electronic services, the speakers presented the center of administrative services "Transparent office" in Vinnytsia, center of administrative services provision in Ivano-Frankivsk, services provided by the Lviv City Council. The presentation of the Kharkov Dispatcher Service as a tool for improving services for citizens raised great interest of the audience.
As a result of the Forum the recommendations were developed addressed to the Government, local authorities, the Association of Ukrainian municipalities and the National Center for e-governance Support. The recommendations will be finalised and sent to these institutions in the following two weeks.
Policy brief on the condition of e-governance in Ukraine is available here. Presentations of the participants can be found at UNDP/MGSDP web-site in section “Presentations”
For more information, please, contact Galyna Smirnova, Monitoring and Communications Officer of UNDP/MGSDP, by tel. (+38044) 584-34-75 or via e-mail: galyna.smirnova at undp.org.ua
