By signing the Tallinn Declaration, all member states of the European Union agree on common goals for e-government development over the next five years, providing direction for both national and pan-European innovation.
While Estonia holds the presidency of the Council of the European Union in the second half of 2017, the country is pushing a digital agenda. On 6 October, all member states of the EU, together with the European Free Trade Association countries Liechtenstein, Norway, Iceland and Switzerland, signed the Tallinn e-government declaration in the Estonian capital.
Read more: EU: The Tallinn Declaration promises a digital future for Europeans
The country's very own cryptocurrency is just the start.
Kaspar Korjus has big plans for Estonia’s future. He’s the managing director of the country’s e-Residency initiative, a futuristic idea that made headlines in 2014 for allowing anyone in the world to become a virtual resident and start a company. Now, Korjus has a bigger goal in mind: to become the world’s first country with its very own cryptocurrency.
The “ambitious new proposal,” outlined in a Medium post in August, would expand on the idea behind e-Residency, which has already seen over 20,000 people sign up. With Estcoin, anyone could invest in Estonia, using something similar to Bitcoin.
Read more: Estonia's Top Futurist Explains How Tech will Make Countries Obsolete
Constitutional support for data safety is the foundation stone for a strong e-governance ecosystem in Estonia.
For Estonia, a European country with a population nearly 1,000 times less than India, the pursuit to establish a national digital identity programme was not any easier. When the nation rolled out its identity programme 15 years ago, similar to India’s Aadhaar project, political debates around the cost of the project and its mandatory nature had erupted. The government believed that the first step to have a strong ecosystem of digital services and e-governance was digital identity. However, that’s just one side of the coin. The push to electronic governance was backed by a data protection legislation.
Read more: EE: Data protection: Legal backing, people’s trust hold the key
Estonia is looking into the future with plans to digitise everything from voting to healthcare
First there was Skype. Next came ‘e-residency’ – and now, it appears, that’s only the start of the digital innovations that Estonian leaders hope to see emerging from their small country in coming years.
Jaak Aaviksoo, the rector of the Tallinn Technical University and a former government defence and education minister, hopes to see his country become a global leader in brain research and artificial intelligence, both fields that rely heavily on data. Then, others suggest, there are new prospects in digital healthcare, online government and cybersecurity. Says Aaviksoo, in an interview with Science|Business: “Information and data is the new oil of the 21st century.”
Estonia is the world leader in digital governance and a founding member of Digital 5 (D5), a global network of evolving digital governments. It is no surprise then that Estonia is creating a borderless digital society for global citizens as the first country to offer e-Residency
The Telegraph’s Britain’s Smart Cities team caught up with Kaspar Korjus, e-Residency Managing Director, Republic of Estonia, to find out about the initiative and how it’s creating financial inclusion and empowerment for citizens worldwide.
Read more: EE: e-Residency: the future of digital entrepreneurship?