Recognition for Maltese e-government services by European Commission

Maltese e-government services have made it to the final stage of the European e-Government Awards 2009 organised by the European Commission.

The awards ceremony will take place on November 19 in Malmö during the fifth Ministerial e-Government Conference, a joint event organised by the European Commission and the Swedish EU Presidency, which aims at monitoring progress in e-government, accelerating the adoption of e-government policies in Europe, and identifying research priorities for the future.

The Inland Revenue Service On-Line at is a finalist in category 2b "e-Government empowering business", while the Malta Environment and Planning Authority (MEPA) Applications is a finalist in category 3 "e-Government enabling administrative efficiency and effectiveness".

Another two Maltese services have been placed in the list of "Good Practice Projects 2009" and have been awarded a "Good Practice" label in the framework of the European e-Government Awards 2009.

These are the Customer Care System at www.servizz.gov.mt and the Motor Vehicle Registration & Licensing Malta accessible at www.vehicleregistration.gov.mt.

The former was recognised for empowering citizens and the latter for enabling administrative efficiency and effectiveness.

During the event, the finalists will participate in a large-scale exhibition to showcase and promote their projects. A committee of judges composed of independent experts in the field will visit the exhibition and will select among the 52 finalists the best project in each of the following four categories:

• e-government supporting the EU single market: strengthening the single market by increasing mobility for businesses and citizens in the EU;

• e-government empowering citizens: improving access to public services for citizens;

• e-government empowering businesses: improving access to public services for companies, by creating business opportunities and generating savings for businesses (particularly SMEs); and

• e-government enabling administrative efficiency and effectiveness: making public services and administrative processes simpler and more efficient, reducing the administrative burden.

The 52 selected projects are managed by public authorities at local, regional or national level from 17 different European countries, providing services in their own locality or cross-border.

All projects make a significant contribution to increasing the efficiency of public services in Europe through the use of digital technologies, the Commission said.

The fourth edition of the prestigious European e-Government Awards aims at promoting best practices and the most innovative electronic solutions that public authorities in Europe have developed to facilitate citizens' and business' access to public services, reduce the administrative burden, and increase public administrations' efficiency. All finalists competing for the Awards use state-of-the-art applications such as innovative websites and portals, SMS-based services, web 2.0 as well as other ICT-based solutions.

The European e-Government Awards is organised every two years, coinciding with regular high-level EU e-government conferences. The purpose of these Awards is to support the implementation of European e-government policy and strategies and facilitate good practice exchange. In this context, since their launch in 2003, the awards have been promoting the best ICT-based solutions for public services in Europe, the Commission said.