IfG.CC -
Institute for eGovernment

“The Sri Lankan Government 3.0 vision is one where we can provide seamless citizen services anytime and anywhere. Integrating mobile technology means citizens can interact, transact and make payment with their mobile devices. Similarly, civil servants become location-independent and are connected all the time,” declared Karunasena.

Mobile communication devices such as mobile phones and tablets have become an inseparable part of our daily life. In addition to the main intended task, communication, these devises can effectively be used to improve health of communities and to reduce the burden of major health issues such as maternal and child health.

Using mobile communication in health care is called mHealth, the most recent health approach preceding teleHealth and eHealth. mHealth (also written as m-health) is a term used for the practice of medicine and public health supported by mobile devices. The term is most commonly used in reference to using mobile communication devices, such as mobile phones, tablet computers and PDAs, for health services and information. mHealth applications include the use of mobile devices in collecting community and clinical health data, delivery of healthcare information to practitioners, researchers, and patients, real-time monitoring of patient vital signs, and direct provision of care.

SRI Lanka has roped in National Computer Systems (NCS), a wholly-owned subsidiary of the SingTel Group, as the lead consultant in its e-government initiative.

The institutional mechanisms of Sri Lanka have been altered for rapid development of society using ICT. Since 2005, the ICT Agency of Sri Lanka (ICTA) has provided leadership in the application of ICT. Its “e-Sri Lanka” program has achieved major economic, developmental, and social improvements.

The Sri Lanka Foreign Employment Bureau (SLFEB) is working with Oman to implement biometrics software for fingerprint data storage of Sri Lankan migrant workers.

Making this comment as the keynote speaker at a recent event on electronic governance, the two-day FutureGov Forum Sri Lanka 2011, which was held in Colombo; he also asserted that the "whole idea of expediting government processes is to save time of citizens.

The Centre, the first of its kind in the country, is born out of a true public private partnership between the Information and Communication Technology Agency of Sri Lanka (ICTA), Sri Lanka Institute of Development Administration (SLIDA), Oracle Corporation Singapore Pte Ltd, PC House and Millennium Information Technologies on behalf of Sun Microsystems and Cisco Systems.

LIRNEasia is a pro-poor, pro-market think tank with researchers scattered across Asia in a virtual network with a prominent ground presence in Colombo. Its mission is catalysing policy change through research to improve people’s lives in the emerging Asia Pacific by facilitating their use of hard and soft infrastructures through the use of knowledge, information and technology.

Recently LIRNEasia has launched ‘After Access – ICT Access and use in Asia and the Global South’, a report based on nationally representative surveys of households and individuals in 23 countries in South America, Africa and Asia. The survey, conducted from April 2017 to January 2019, was based on 46,746 face-to-face interviews each lasting for about 90 minutes. It has covered a wide range of topics related to the use of mobile phones, Internet, social media and other platforms.

Sri Lanka’s Minister of Digital infrastructure and Information Technology – Ajith P. Perera in a recent interview said that government has ambitious plans to bring the entire government under one umbrella on the e-government front, first step towards that will be done by creating Sri Lanka’s “Population Registry” - which may be called the “Mother of all Databases” according to him. The said database will have information of entire population at databases centrally built and administered for all government ministries and departments to share data. Following are the excerpts from the interview.

Accordingly, Asian Development Bank’s (ADB) Creative Productivity Index (CPI) has ranked Sri Lanka at the 19th position among 22 economies.

The World Bank launched its Information and Communications for Development 2009: Extending Reach and Increasing Impact report in Colombo on Friday.

Improving broadband access, the report says, could revolutionise economic growth in developing countries such as Sri Lanka.

The ICT Agency (ICTA) led efforts to get Sri Lanka ratify the UN Electronic Communications Convention bore fruit, when Sri Lanka’s Permanent Representative to the UN in New York Dr Rohan Perera deposited the Instrument of Ratification in New York recently. This is sequel to approval from the Cabinet of Ministers obtained in June. The Cabinet approval authorized the Ministry of Foreign Affairs to deposit the Instrument of Ratification at the UN Treaty Office so as to ensure Sri Lanka’s entry into this only UN Convention on the subject of international e-Commerce and on the use of cross-border e-Contracts.

With its ratification Sri Lanka becomes the first country in South Asia and 2nd country after Singapore to become a State Party to the Convention. Countries like Australia, Thailand, Vietnam and China are already preparing domestic legislation to ratify this Convention. However, Sri Lanka’s ratification of this important UN Convention was possible because the country already has the required domestic legislation, namely the Electronic Transactions Act No. 19 of 2006, which is based on this UN Convention. The Convention will enter into force for Sri Lanka on 1st February 2016.

The discussions on the need for a new e-Government policy was highlighted during a high-level workshop which gathered a number of Chief Innovation Officers, and key persons from the academe and the private sector.

Sri Lanka will get access to Indian digital expertise and infrastructure under a deal between the two countries covering electronic public services delivery like e-learning, tele-medicine and office work and linking universities in a high speed network.

The High Commission of India said the agreement to expand information technology cooperation was signed during a visit to the island by Ravi Shankar Prasad, Indian Minister of Law & Justice and Electronics & Information Technology.

The government plans to integrate all public sector systems and applications and create one-stop service centres for citizens, said Reshan Dewapura.

Making a significant progress from its preceding ranking, in the 2020 United Nations E-Government Development Index (EGDI), Sri Lanka has advanced its position to the 85th from 94th in 2018. While this wasn’t the highest position Sri Lanka has achieved over the twenty years of survey period, it can be seen a substantial advancement as country position has been sliding over the last few years.

In sub components, Sri Lanka has achieved a Very High Human Capital Index (HCI) with a High Telecommunication Infrastructure Index (TII) and a High Online Services Index (OSI). It is the only South Asian country to make such a balanced achievement. Bangladesh and India have been ranked ‘Middle’ in their Telecommunication Infrastructure, while Pakistan is ranked ‘Low’. The survey identifies Sri Lanka as a Sub-Regional Leader and its position is used to benchmark the rest in South Asian region.

The e-Local Government system was launched today with the objective of making local government bodies efficient.

The facility implemented under the Ministry of Local Government and Provincial Councils and Ministry of Telecommunication and Digital Infrastructure as a joint effort enables the public to make all the payments to the local government bodies through Internet electronic cards.