Malta is the EU Leader in e-Government

BLATA-L-BAJDA, Malta, December 16, 2010 - The European Commission has released a summary of the 9th
eGovernment Benchmarking Report which measures public sector performance of
32 countries (27 EU member states plus Croatia, Iceland, Norway, Switzerland
and Turkey). The report measures six core indicators and through a ranking
system, it shows the best performing countries that have implemented the most
mature e-Government services. This year Malta was established as the European
leader in e-Government after achieving 100% in five of the six core
indicators measured.

The first core indicator, 'Online sophistication', measures
the extent to which eGovernment services allow for interaction and/or
transaction between Government and citizens or businesses. The second
indicator, 'Full online availability' measures to which extent the 20 basic
services are available; Malta scored 100% in both.

The third and forth core indicators are User-experience for
'eServices' and 'national portals'. These cover aspects of usability,
transparency, privacy, multi-channel policy and the possibility for users to
provide feedback; Malta attained 100% in both.

The final two indicators are related to eProcurement.
'eProcurement visibility' measures to what extent potential suppliers are
able to find information and links to eProcurement by contracting
authorities. Malta scored 100%. 'eProcurement availability' measures to what
extent the eProcurment process can be carried out online and Malta scored
76%.

Hon Dr Austin Gatt, Minister for Information, Transport and
Communication in Malta said: "We have always believed in the ability of the
Internet to act as a tool to transform and enhance public service delivery.
This is the factual realisation of Government's Vision 2015, wherein we lead
the pack through our knowledge, capabilities and determination to cut
red-tape."

Claudio Grech, Chairman of the Malta Information Technology
Agency (MITA), the agency responsible for e-Government in Malta said: "We
converged the technological and administrative developments in the Maltese
government into an e-Government synergy enabling us to remain ahead of the
curve. We extended the online environment boundaries to open ourselves to a
wider audience, capitalising on Internet penetration which has increased
exponentially over the last few years."

The benchmark study has been annually prepared since 2001 and
is compiled by Capgemini, Sogeti, IDC, RAND Europe and the Danish
Technological Institute for EC's Directorate General Information Society. The
full report will be published in January 2011.

For more information about MITA, visit www.mita.gov.mt

Further resources on this story

www.mita.gov.mt/egov2010

MITA Logos

www.mita.gov.mt/mediakit

Press Contacts: Mr Roderick Spiteri (MITA), +35625992316 / +35699405664, roderick.spiteri at gov.mt .