Belarus might share best practices in e-government with CIS states

Belarus might share its best practices in establishing an electronic government with other CIS member states, World Bank Country Manager for Belarus Young Chul Kim told reporters on 3 June, BelTA has learnt.

Several interesting ideas were put forward during a joint conference of Belarus, the Republic of Korea and the World Bank that is taking place in Minsk these days. These ideas can be implemented using Belarus and South Korea’s experience in the field of information and communication technologies, Young Chul Kim said. One of the ideas deals with joint promulgation of an electronic government in other CIS member states. Belarus has accumulated substantial experience in this field. The country is up to an ambitious task – to make it to the top 30 countries in the ICT Development Index by 2015. A lot has already been done for that. At present the country is ranked 41st in this rating, up by five positions from the previous year. It will be easier for Belarusian specialists to work on this task as they are well familiar with the legal framework of the CIS member states and the peculiarity of this region, the WB representative said.

Besides, the World Bank is preparing a project on the development of a transit corridor along the M6 highway (Minsk-Grodno). “We plan to include the customs component into the project, which will allow speeding up cargo clearance. Electronic customs is a great way to automate and simplify customs procedures,” Young Chul Kim said. He emphasized that this idea is getting particularly relevant in view of the establishment of the Eurasian Economic Union, as commodity and cargo flow between the EU and the Eurasian Economic Union is expected to increase significantly soon. Belarus can and should benefit from the transit of goods and passengers between the two huge integration unions, the WB representative believes.

Another promising cooperation avenue is joint training, retraining and qualifications enhancement of Belarusian specialists in Korea and Korean specialists in Belarus. Joint training programs might be launched either in the second half of 2014 or in 2015.

Ambassador of the Republic of Korea to Belarus Yang Joong-mo expressed confidence that the use of Korean information technologies by the customs service, healthcare and other services will give a boost to the development of the entire economy. Belarus, in turn, will work on encouraging Korean companies to bring modern technologies to Belarus, which will facilitate implementation of efficient import-substituting projects. After all, there are enough world-class IT specialists in Belarus.

During the conference Belarusian and Korean experts exchanged their expertise and knowledge in the field of ICT, including in electronic government. They also visited a number of companies and organizations to see how cutting-edge technologies are used in customs administration, land management, healthcare, and cyber-security.