The Information and Communications Technology (ICT) Ministry has been given Cabinet approval to set up an e-government agency as an operational body to drive the establishment of e-government services and pursue the Smart Thailand policy.
The director of Government Information Technology Services (GITS), Sak Segkhoonthod, said GITS would be transformed into the new agency. The change will be official in the near future.
To drive and support e-government services, the agency will have threeresponsibilities: laying down an e-government infrastructure network (GIN),establishing information-technology standards for government agencies and providingconsulting services to government agencies.
He said the agency planned to rent network infrastructure from TOT and CAT to provide the GIN to government agencies around the country.
Service infrastructure will be provided to government organisations under the termsof service-level agreements in order to ensure that they receive quality services.
The agency is also planning to provide access to the GIN to districts andcommunities around the country, in order to reduce the present gap in information-technology access between people in metropolitan and remote areas. It aims to have all government agencies covered by the GIN within four years.
Meanwhile, it will set up a common e-mail service for e-government agencies and their staff.
"We will provide a quality of infrastructure services such that it will create confidence among officials and government agencies in entering the e-governmentnetwork. It will provide an e-government mail system as well as supplyingapplications-as-a-service to the public via e-government cloud computing," Sak said.
Moreover, the agency will provide common applications such as video conferencingand data back-up based on a national broadband network for government agencies, in order to reduce agency budgets and lessen the complexity of information among government organisations.
"I think that when the agency provides video conferencing, it will help officials toreduce the time they spend at meetings and reduce the costs of travel. Government officials working in remote areas will no longer need to go to meetings in Bangkok. Instead, they can meet in a video conference," he said.
Meanwhile, the agency will utilise best practices in establishing standards for e-government architecture. Within this year, it plans to announce five back-office standards for government agencies, such as human-resources and budgeting systems and e-documents. It also plans to develop e-government service standards for government agencies so that in the future Thai people will be able to access all e-government services via a single sign-on.
Sak said the next steps, over the next several years, would include the provision of mobile government services, or m-government, and a "one-stop" system covering all government agencies.
Throughout the establishment of e-government services, the new agency will provide consulting advice to all government agencies and will also train government staff to enhance the level of IT literacy among officials. This will include training in IT and security management.
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Autor(en)/Author(s): Jirapan Boonnoon
Quelle/Source: The Nation, 10.02.2011
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