MANILA, PHILIPPINES | BusinessWorld, Thursday, February 21, 2002
Gov't lines up projects for US$8-M Canadian aid
By Helen A. Jimenez, Reporter
The Philippine government is identifying ICT (information and
communication technologies)-related projects to be covered by the
multimillion-peso technical cooperation fund committed to the
Philippines by the Canadian International Development Agency (CIDA).
The National Economic and Development Authority (NEDA), Department of
Science and Technology (DoST), National Computer Center (NCC) and the
Information Technology and Electronic Commerce Council (ITECC) are
heading this effort.
CIDA is the federal agency responsible for delivering most of Canada's
Official Development Assistance (ODA) or foreign aid.
It will be recalled that President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo and Canada
Prime Minister Jean Chretien witnessed the signing of a Letter of Intent
(LOI) on January 29, 2002 during the president's recent visit to Canada
for a US$8 million (approximately 410.44 million Philippine pesos at
PhP51.305=US$1) technical cooperation program to help the Philippine
government's ICT development plans.
Spread over five years, the CIDA fund will be used to implement the
E-Governance for Efficiency and Effectiveness (e-3) project, which aims
to improve the delivery of basic information and services to the public
via ICT.
Danny F. Pabellon, director of NEDA's Information Technology
Coordination Staff, said in an interview that the CIDA assistance seeks
to "fill in the gaps" for ICT projects that the Philippine government
cannot fund.
He said the e-3 Project took off from the Multi-Year Facilitation of
Information Technology in the Philippines (MYFIT Project) which NEDA and
CIDA started to discuss in August 1998 to explore ways to expand
Canadian government assistance in ICT to Philippine government.
The e-3 Project will focus on strengthening the capabilities of key
government agencies to maximize use of ICT.
Mr. Pabellon said the agencies involved in drafting the recommendations
to CIDA have identified several government initiatives to be covered by
the fund.
These initiatives include the development of a Philippine IT database
with regular monitoring system. "This is very important for planning. We
cannot have good planning activity for IT unless we have a good
database," Mr. Pabellon said.
The National Statistics Office (NSO) has already announced its plan to
conduct an ICT survey this year but Mr. Pabellon said the project needs
additional funding for wider coverage and thoroughness. The proposed
database seeks to regularly monitor key IT indicators in the country.
Another project that is being considered is the expansion of the
Department of Budget and Management's (DBM) electronic procurement
system, which was also developed with CIDA assistance. Mr. Pabellon said
the project may need additional funding to enable other government
agencies to link to the e-procurement system and to expand its
suppliers' list and equipment catalogue.
Other projects that should be prioritized involve the acceleration of
front-line services that deal directly with the public, said Mr.
Pabellon. He added that CIDA also wants some funds to go to manpower
development in government, particularly in software and applications
development as well as in the retooling of personnel with ICT skills.
Mr. Pabellon said a mission from CIDA will be coming to the country some
time next month or in April to discuss details about the e-3 Project
with the Philippine government team. While NEDA is actively involved in
the planning stage of the project, Mr. Pabellon said NCC of the DoST
will be the lead implementing agency. The specific projects will also be
endorsed by the ITECC e-governance committee.
After the Philippine government will have endorsed the specific IT
projects, they will be presented for approval by CIDA's Project Approval
Design (PAD) Mission. The PAD Mission will then endorse the projects to
CIDA Headquarters for approval, after which there will be a signing of
memorandum of understanding. The implementation plan will then be
finalized and the projects will be started.
Some of the expected outcomes of the e-3 Project include: sustainable
organizations at the coordination and implementation levels; sustained
ability of the Philippine government to monitor progress in the use and
application of ICT; an environment conducive to establishing an
information infrastructure; and replicable service delivery
applications.
------------
***GKD is solely supported by EDC, an NGO that is a GKP member***
To post a message, send it to: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
To subscribe or unsubscribe, send a message to:
<[EMAIL PROTECTED]>. In the 1st line of the message type:
subscribe gkd OR type: unsubscribe gkd
Archives of previous GKD messages can be found at:
<http://www.edc.org/GLG/gkd/>
