Central and Eastern European Countries Synthesis of Update Memos - November 2000

1. Introduction

The following document summarises development which occurred within the last quarter in the field of IS promotional activities (conferences, seminars, forums, IS national and regional strategies…) in Central and Eastern European Countries.

Large investments were made for the IS promotional activities in telecommunications. Among others some of these large investments were made for the development of national infrastructures, applications of advanced information and communication technologies.

In all EEC countries information technologies are becoming an essential component of national development strategies. E-economy and related issues were key issues discussed during the 3^rd quarter of the year 2000. Except national programs, conferences, forums, large investments on the telecommunications field, all countries start focusing more and more on the elaboration and approval of laws on electronic documents.

Examples of the main IS promotional activities that occurred during the 3^rd quarter of the year 2000 are detailed below. You can find more details in the ESIS Knowledge Base.

2. Governmental activities supporting organisational awareness of Information Society

The key issue treated in most countries at governmental level was the improvement of the essential telecommunications infrastructures as well as the licensing of second/ third mobile operators and ISP providers.

Several events took place in Albania during the 3^rd quarter of the year 2000. The incumbent operator Albtelecom signed a co-operation contract with Siemens Company for installing new telephone centrals. Over 50 000 lines were installed in Tirana, Saranda, Delvina, Popradeci and Dureci. Thus 1000 ISDN lines are ready to serve now. For the first time Albania is going to use ISDN lines with a 64 KB/ sec transmission speed. At the same time, Albtelecom got the license as a national ISP provider. At present, Albtelecom is ready to operate as a national ISP, as well as Back Bone operator. The third important event was the launch of the tender for the second mobile operator in Albania by the Ministry of Public Economy and Privatisation.

In Bosnia and Herzegovina the public PTT company launched a tender for repairing the telecommunications networks within the Bihac area. The same company stoke deals with Siemens and Ericsson concerning the second phase building up of the GSM mobile network. The telecommunications equipment should be installed by the end of the year 2000. By this time two contracts, additional 180 000 users should be connected to the GSM network.

The Co-ordination Council on IS at the Council of Ministers in Bulgaria, has created a Centre for Support of IS.

The major promotional activity which have supported the development of IS in the Czech Republic during the 3^rd quarter of the year 2000 was the definite accomplishment of the approval process of the Electronic Signature Act. This Act should come into effect in October 2000. Another promotional activity which can be mentioned is the preparation for sale of the UMTS licenses, with ending tender for FWA. These additional revenues will compensate the State Information Policy increase of the CZK 1 billion budget on implementation action.

In Estonia, an expert committee was held with the purpose to analyse the national information communication system and the establishment of a State Information Communication Foundation.

Two big governmental projects were demonstrated by Hungarian Government during the 3^rd quarter of the year 2000. The first one "Government File Registry System" deals with electronic file management, the second one "KIKERES" aims at administrative data property registration.

The Cabinet of Ministers has accepted "Concept on legal status of electronic documents" in Latvia. Special regulation for use of electronic signature is envisaged, with all of the signature functions guaranteed: identification of the document, declaration "animus signandi" author’s and affirmation of content of the document. It is envisaged to introduce electronic documents in the following schedule :

• Elaboration and approving of normative acts - 07/01/2001 ;
• Trial period - 01/01/2002 ;
• General introduction of electronic documents - 01/01/2003.

The updated version 2000 of the National Program "Informatics" pays special attention to:

• Priority significance of the informatics as a branch of the national economy to increase the GDP and the level of the society welfare;
• Training of the skilled IT specialists including training of specialists of the highest academic and professional level.

From the main steps of the Lithuanian government towards the promotion of information society it is important to mention the announcement of strategic directions for IS development based on the computerisation of Lithuanian schools, modernisation of science and education system, promotion and support of e-business. The second big step of the government was the announcement of the plan to establish e-government.

In Romania, two governmental institutions are implied in the promotion of the Information Society:

• National Agency for Communications and Informatics (NACI)
• National Agency for Science Technology and Innovation (ANSTI)

3. IS national / regional strategies

Another impulse, which could lead to a substantial acceleration in the development of the IS in the Czech Republic, also on the level of individual households would be the time limited taxation relief introduced for purchases of computers for non-commercial purposes.

79% of the total number of projects carried out in Estonia were launched on the national scale. This high percentage reflects the natural advantage of a small country in innovations.

About national events, the most important is the national program "Tiger Leap" held on by the Estonian Educational and Research Network.

• On regional level, two important projects were held by: "e-Tartu", programme initiated by Tartu City Government, and "Tiger Tour 1999" introducing information technology application possibilities by lectures.

In Latvia, one of the most important project held on the national level is "United National Libraries Information System" which has been developed to realise principles of knowledge management. The key elements of the concept are :

• Libraries should become the main providers of all types of informations (business/finance, state significance, scientific technical references…) in the country ;
• Any library should be able to provide with a full set of advanced information services to users.

Concerning the local level, the constitution of a Steering Committee for the United Information System Project for Municipalities should be mentioned. The main purpose of this project is to supply a qualitative information support to all municipalities to:

• Ensure qualitative services intended to state institutions, municipalities and population;
• Organise a qualitative exchange aimed at state institutions, municipalities and population.

4. Non-governmental organisations and their IS activities

Open Society Fund in Sarajevo (Bosnia & Herzegovina) offered dial-up access to the Internet via modems . Standard PPP service is available together with web based e-mail and webhosting.

A specialised Association for Internet Advertising has been founded in the Czech Republic.

In Romania, the following professional associations participate in Information System promotional actions and make lobby for the development of the IS : ANIS, ARIES, ATIC, ROMINFOR…)

The Cisco Systems, Inc. announced an agreement to provide US$2,6millions state-of-art Internet protocol equipment to Makedonski Telekomunikacii, the Macedonian state telecommunications company. At the same time, 6 potential strategic investors in the Macedonian Telecommunications are likely to buy a 51% share of the incumbent.

5. Educational Issues

From the major events which occurred in Hungary, we can mention the the following ones:

• Inauguration of the computer science training laboratory on Cisco Network Academy.
• Launching of free Internet courses by Network for Youth public utility company. Besides these free Internet courses the company also provides free Internet access for youth organisations.
• Launching of the programme called "HiNet" by the Hungarian Ministry of Youth and Sport. This programme is intended to connect all the Hungarian youth communities to Internet.
• Organisation of Internet Marketing Entrepreneurial Camp with the aim to awake the entrepreneurial activities sense on Internet.
• Broker training course for employees of large and medium-sized companies sensitive to strategic decisions and organisations supporting small and medium-scale enterprises and for local governments.
• Launching of a new Internet homepage of National Children and Youth Parliament where young people can find the right answer to all of the questions that concern them (www.csakhogytudd.hu)

New Macedonian Ministry of Education became the national Information Society co-ordinator.

6. Actions promoting e-commerce

The Centre for Electronic Commerce in the Czech Republic continued its expert patronage on electronic commerce over regular Tuesday’s meetings (www.firsttuesday.cz) and has completed its activity by similar meetings called Wireless Wednesday, started from September the 20^th. It should be mentioned that turnover of "Internet shops" has grown by 497% year-to-year to 30 Mil of Czech crowns.

An e-commerce conference and exhibition was held in Budapest, Hungary with the objective to introduce the e-commerce potential to companies and to the entrepreneurial community. Lectures provided complex international outlook on the most important guidelines and trends of the field with special attention to the e-commerce solutions of countries of the Central Eastern European region.

E-economy issues were key issues presented and discussed in conferences and seminars organised during the 3^rd quarter of the year 2000 in Poland. Thus, the conference entitled "Information Society and Economic Development of Poland" was held with the objectives to define the e-commerce context development, the computer telecommunication services impact on the regional development and new communication technologies in the local government management. Another conference which should be mention "Secure E-business" devoted to the security of electronic transactions.

The major event concerning the e-commerce development in Romania was the European conference "E-COMM-LINE 2000" . This conference had five sections with various subjects: e-commerce, e-banking, telebanking, teleworking, e-working, on-line services, the social and economic influence.

7. Conferences, Seminars, Forums, Surveys

The major event which occurred during the 3^rd quarter of the year 2000 in Bulgaria was the International Technical Fair Autumn 2000. Around 4700 companies from 50 countries participated in the fair. The specialised trade-show "Info Tech" about the information and telecommunications technologies was organised within this International Fair. The main purpose of this salon was to promote Internet services in Bulgaria.

One of the most important expert conference in the Czech Republic took place on September with the main topic of the Role of Universities in the Information Society. Other seminar which contributed to the development of the awareness of IS was the seminar called E-Commerce 2000 – the current state and the future which took place during the traditional International Engineering Fair in Brno.

In September, a high level conference "Genes, Nation and Money" took place in Tartu, Estonia. We should mention that gene technology is one of Estonian most successful research and development area. In August, for example, the Parliament started proceeding the draft of Human Gene Research Act.

Moreover, the local institution "AS Emor" studying Estonian Information Society developments, conducted studies on Internet habits of Estonian population. The last study published by this company relieves following results: 84% of Estonian companies used the Internet to send and read e-mails. 69% to access on-line publications and about 50% to access Internet banking. 16% of Estonian population use the Internet, 38% of Estonian inhabitants use PCs and only 18% own PC. Another Estonian company, "Turunduskonsultatsioonide OÜ" published results about companies web pages. According to this study 29% of organisations have a web page, 8% are creating their web pages and 20% are planning to do it. 67% of web pages are available in local language and 18% had both Estonian and English versions.

In Hungary, following conferences and seminars took place during the 3^rd trimester of the year 2000:

• Commercial exhibition and conference "ISEC – Cards Eastern Europe" which dealt with smart card and information security;
• Congress "Together in the information society" with the aim to exchange ideas about socio-economic issues of the information society from information literacy to the latest developments of IS;
• Exhibition "GENIUS 2000" organised by the Association of Hungarian Inventors;
• 8^th Infocommunications Conference "In the doorway of unlimited communication"

The most important IS promotional events which took place in Lithuania were:

• International conference "Jump into the new e-Economy" with the aim to introduce the main trends of the new e-economy and of the knowledge management development in the information society, and the impact of information technologies on the contemporary society.
• Annual "International Trade Fair of Information Society Technologies" which is divided into specialised areas on major technological themes: telecommunications, complex IT solutions, e-commerce, data transfer, finance management systems and office equipment technologies.
• 2^nd international conference "Information Society 2000" with main objectives to present the most recent information technologies and telecommunications markets as well as the intellectual potential of Lithuanian, Latvian, Estonian and foreign partners

An international conference on the forthcoming censuses in Balkan countries was held in Macedonia, on which recommendations on intensification of co-operation between the national statistical offices were agreed.

From the key issues presented and discussed during the range of conferences which took place in Poland, we can mention the following ones:

• "Conference on modern strategies of product management" devoted to e-business; marketing on the Internet; portals and hubs as interactive media in the Internet; advertising and promotion through Internet; new strategies of e-commerce; Internet in relation to customers and many others related issues.
• "IT applications in Banking" organised under the auspices of the President of the National Bank of Poland. The main topic of the conference was IT in creating and improving bank products in the integration field within the European Union.
• "National Conference on Multimedia and Network Information Systems" with the aim to exchange ideas and experiences on the new ways associated with multimedia and network information systems.