A new United Nations report has found that e-government is an effective tool for facilitating integrated policies and public service by promoting accountable and transparent institutions, such as through open data and participatory decision-making, and therefore it has the potential to help support the implementation of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development and its 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).
“For ICTs [information and communication technologies] to truly transform the public sector into an instrument of sustainable development, efficiency in service delivery must be also coupled with social equity and ensuring that all people can access quality services,” wrote Wu Hongbo, the top UN official on economic and social matters, in his foreword to the report.
“Such efforts are vital to making sure that the sustainable development goals are at the centre of all government policies and of public management and that no one is left behind,” he added.
The report 2016 UN E-Government Survey, produced every two years by the UN Department of Economic and Social Affairs, is the only global report that assesses the e-government development status of all 193 Member States of the UN.