The 2001 work programme

The European Commission has adopted the IDA work programme for 2001. A key element is increased support for Government Online, one of the 11 priority areas identified by the eEurope initiative launched by the European Commission in December 1999. This focus was reinforced by the Commission's 'eEurope 2002 impact and priorities' communication to the Stockholm European Council meeting on 23 and 24 March 2001.

Principal objectives of 'Government Online' are to make public information as accessible as possible and to provide electronic assess to basic public services by 2002 to 2003. Co-operation between Member States and the Commission is critical to achieve these goals. IDA is playing a key role in these efforts by means of its established co-operation with the Member States through the TAC (Telematics for Administrations Committee) and IDA's many existing activities to meet the challenges identified by the eEurope action plan .
 
IDA generic services provide an interoperability framework and a common infrastructure at EU level allowing implementation of Government Online. These generic services, other horizontal actions and measures, and IDA sectoral networks already provide a bridge between the back-office processes of Member States to support administration to administration exchanges. IDA is also in an ideal situation to support the delivery of services to citizens and enterprises, particularly those with a European cross-border dimension.
 
Specific actions include:

• Increased co-operation with national, regional and local administrations to identify new services and share best practice at a pan-European level
• Support for portal services and single points of access
• Promoting use of electronic certificates and the interoperability of public key infrastructure (PKI)
• Interactive policy making tools and
• Guidelines and machine-based translation systems for multilingual web interfaces.

Through projects of common interest, the 2001 work programme foresees actions in new areas such as humanitarian aid, judicial and internal affairs, education and tourism.