IfG.CC -
Institute for eGovernment

Markovic stated at a press conference held after the government session that as of now the state bodies will be obliged to issue all documents that are in their possession via e-administration, such as birth and citizenship certificates, regardless of the municipality and town in which those documents are registered.

Serbian Prime Minister Mirko Cvetkovic said that today’s government session will not only be remembered as the first electronic session, but also as a session that helped Serbia join other countries that have functioned like that for some time now.

“By using the Internet, the public administration makes its operations closer to citizens and companies. E-government contributes to the acceleration of the process of transition to the economy based on know-how, through an easier access and use of the public administration services,” said Jasna Matić, Minister of Telecommunications and Information Society at a meeting of the Special Working Group for E-Government Development in the Republic of Serbia and representatives of American Chamber of Commerce.

“By using the Internet, the public administration makes its operations closer to citizens and companies. E-government contributes to the acceleration of the process of transition to the economy based on know-how, through an easier access and use of the public administration services,” said Jasna Matić, Minister of Telecommunications and Information Society at a meeting of the Special Working Group for E-Government Development in the Republic of Serbia and representatives of American Chamber of Commerce.

As the ongoing buzz would have it, the initiative for this informal meeting came from Slobodan Markovic, Special Advisor to the Serbian Minister of Telecommunications and Information Society, who also happens to be a very forthcoming and active member of the online community, and Zoran Torbica, CEO of CRI Domains and one of the initiators and Vice President of the Serbian Center for Internet Development, who has been a part of the local online community, one could safely say, since its inception.

Serbian Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Economy and Regional Development Mladjan Dinkic today handed over the first business registration documents issued according to the new simplified business registration procedure which takes only three days, thus inaugurating the one-stop business registration system in Serbia.

Milan Šolaja, CEO, Vojvodina ICT Cluster (VOICT), writes in the forward of the report ICT in Serbia – At a Glance 2018: “You journalists should pay more attention to what is going on. Everyone is writing about the Serbian export of raspberries as a huge national success, and nobody knows that we export more software than raspberries.” Mr Šolaja said this to a journalist at the DanubeIT Conference in Novi Sad early in 2011.

The ICT sector in Serbia is constantly growing and has recently seen double digit growth, and in 2017 Serbia’s ICT exports reached 900 million euros (21.5 per cent more than in 2016). The reason for Serbia’s success in the ICT sector has to do with a strong push from the government as well as various initiatives by private companies and non-profit organisations.

At the presentation of the project “e-government” on the fourth day of the “Knowledge Factory”fair at ComTrade, Matic said that ministers are attending a short project training course and that on June 11 all material at the session will be in electronic format.

According to the decision, the group's task is to define a detailed plan for the development of the national broadband network, and the role of the state telecommunication infrastructure in the functioning of this network.

The working group, headed by Serbian Prime Minister Mirko Cvetkovic, should also establish the regulatory conditions that will secure the sustainability and development of the national broadband network.

Serbia's Regulatory Agency for Electronic Communications and Postal Services (Ratel) has enabled users of radio frequency spectrum to submit applications for the issue of licenses electronically. In this way, the procedure for issuing licenses will be accelerated by 50 percent, and the need for printing documents significantly reduced.

Thanks to an agreement signed with the Office for Information Technology and eGovernment of the Government of the Republic of Serbia, electronic payment and monitoring of all payments related to this service will be enabled.

Serbia is one of the most developed countries in the world in terms of digitization, said Marta Arsovska Tomovska from the Prime Minister’s Office today.

“Serbia had a vision which is being fulfilled in the current government’s mandate. In other countries, this process lasts between 10 and 15 years,” Tomovska told Tanjug at the conference “Digital Cooperation: Transforming Governments”, organized by the Government of the Republic of Serbia and UNDP.

Serbia has had the highest e-government development index in Europe over the past two years, the 2016 UN e-government survey has shown.

Tanjug reported this quoting a statement from the Ministry of Public Administration and Local Self-Government.

Serbia is the second-fastest growing economy in Europe after Hungary. A lot is being done in the country to increase the living standard of people and match the day-to-day reality of Serbian people to the Western European one.

The country’s top business people and entrepreneurs gathered recently at the Kopaonik Business Forum to discuss the future of the country, its economic potential, and future strategies. This gathering is often referred to as Serbia’s Davos. This is where all the major discussions around the topic of economic development are made and where the agenda for the future of the country is created.

Dragutinovic said at a news conference that the aim of introducing e-government is to increase the efficiency of state institutions, improve the quality of services and reduce the costs of state administration.

The government last year adopted an e-government development strategy to be implemented by 2013, she noted and added that the funds received from the World Bank are of great importance for the continuation of reforms in our country.

The Eastern European country of Serbia is trying to make the difficult transition into the digital economy model of the 21st Century. After decades under communism, the nation has struggled to expand its economy through traditional goods and services. Now, it wishes to take on the digital marketplace, seeing that as a way to quickly grow in a modern world.

The World Bank has announced that it is ready to help Serbia make that transition. In its annual development report, the World Bank noted, "countries who invest more into digital technologies achieve bigger growth." As a result, Tony Verheijen, World Bank Country Manager for Serbia announced Thursday that he was pleased the World Bank would be able to assist Serbia to step into this new marketplace.