In the new UN report launched this afternoon in New York, Uruguay stands out for continuing for the third consecutive edition as the leader in Latin America and the Caribbean and for joining, for the first time, the countries with a "very high" e-government index.
Repeating its 34th position globally, with its score improving from 0.7237 in 2016 to 0.7858 in 2018, Uruguay moves up to the most advanced group, made up of countries that score above 0.75 on the index. It is the only Latin American and Caribbean country in this group. In the region, it is followed by Chile (0.7350, ranked 42nd), Argentina (0.7335, ranked 43rd) and Brazil (0.7327, ranked 44th).
The report also includes the e-participation index, in which Uruguay's score increased from 0.7119 in 2016 to 0.9157 in 2018, ranking 26th globally.
For José Clastornik, Executive Director of the Agency for Electronic Government and the Information and Knowledge Society of the Presidency of the Republic (Agesic), "these very positive achievements reflect the commitment of all public bodies to the digital transformation of government; it is the recognition of a collective effort".
The report highlights the Uruguay Digital Agenda 2020 and, in particular, its objective of a government of proximity. Likewise, the democratisation of access to all procedures as a government priority, including their traceability and access to them through a single user with the State.
The ranking is a snapshot of the situation as of the second half of 2017. "We are making rapid progress. Currently half of the procedures can be completed online from start to finish and by 2020 they will be fully digital, so by the next report we should see even better results," Clastornik added, according to a statement from the agency.
Denmark, new world leader Denmark ranks first globally - previously ranked ninth. A highlight is that the Danes have made digital interaction with the government legally mandatory, with options for help in other channels for those who have difficulty transacting electronically. Australia and South Korea follow, maintaining their second and third positions from the 2016 edition. The UK - the previous leader - drops a few places to fourth.
The publication devotes chapters to disaster risk management, cybersecurity and digital governance at the local level, presenting for the first time an index piloted in 40 cities. It also addresses rapidly evolving technologies such as data analytics, artificial intelligence, "smart things", virtual and augmented reality, and distributed registry technologies such as blockchain.
The index provides an indicative measure of e-government, assessing the performance of one government against others. It is a weighted average of normalised scores ranging from 0 to 1, in three dimensions: online services (140 criteria verified by volunteers), telecommunications infrastructure (ITU indicators) and human capital (UNDP and UNESCO indicators).
The report is produced every two years by the Public Institutions and Digital Government Division of the United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs, working with the Regional Commissions and other UN agencies, as well as a number of international researchers and experts.
Source: Montevideo Portal
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