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Friday, February 21, 2003
RP way behind in e-governance
THE Philippines lags behind other countries in e-governance development although electronic components are its chief export.
Dr. Ibarra Gonzales, director general of the National Computer Center (NCC), said the country rated a low 1.44 in the category of Minimal E-Government Capacity against a Global Index of 1.62 in 2001.
He said many things need to be done, particularly in information and communication technology (ICT) infrastructure and in human capital which are the bases of the E-Government Index.
The country was classified as "evolving" along with Brunei, Indonesia
and Vietnam in an e-Asean Readiness Survey.
Countries such as United States, Australia and Singapore belong to the highest category of High e-Government Capacity with ratings of 2.00 to 3.25, while Poland, Saudi Arabia and Malaysia fell on the medium category with ratings of 1.6 to 1.99.
Ibarra discussed e-governance during a recent e-governance convention
at the Royal Mandaya Hotel.
He explained that e-governance or electronic governance is the use of
ICT to promote more efficient and effective government. This involves the delivery of government services and information to the public through electronic means and the direct participation of constituents in government activities.
Electronics remain the country's number export, contributing 54.2 percent to the total exports in 2002 but e-Governance largely depends on the installation of ICT infrastructure and skills.
Ibarra said as of April 2002, there were 76 local telephone service providers catering to 3.1 million subscribers for a teledensity of 4.1 percent.
Local telephone services are available in 50 percent of the total number of cities and municipalities covering approximately 75 percent of the total population.
Mobile communication or cellular phone services serve more than 10 million subscribers or 14 subscribers for every 100, covering about 70 percent of the population.
There are 183 Internet Access Service providers with 1.5 million subscribers or about 2 per 100 population.
"As you can see, major issues still need to be addressed in the areas of inadequate infrastructure and limited access especially in most rural areas," he said.
Based on the 2001 E-Government Index, he said, the Philippines had 1.93 personal computers for every 100 individuals, three percent of its population on-line.
The NCC Policies, Plans and Monitoring Office (PPMO) survey showed that out of 379 non-government agencies, 97 percent or 368 maintain websites and that the remaining 11 still have to install websites.
Out of 106 state universities and colleges, 80.2 percent or 85 SUCs have websites.
At the local government unit level, 87.3 percent of the 79 provinces have established websites; 81.6 percent of the 114 cities and 14.2 percent of the 1,496 municipalities are on-line.
Ibarra said the country has an edge in terms of availability in human resources though it is experiencing a brain-drain of qualified personnel who preferred to work abroad.
Basing on recent survey, he said the country registers a 94-percent literacy rate, has a skilled labor force of 29 million able to speak
English, and is able to produce about 70,000 IT and computer science related graduates annually.
(February 21, 2003 issue)
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