Course Title:

e-Government IS365
Lecture 2
 E-Government in Developing Countries
• How did Government departments, in many developing
countries, start e-government?
– published information on websites as a first step towards e-
government.
– Many of these sites were poorly designed and the departments do
not update or monitor the quality of information.
– Initially, the online publishing of information was targeted at
attracting foreign investments.
– But as the Internet penetration grew in urban areas, many sites
began to focus on delivering information and services to the
citizens and businesses.
– A large number of developing countries America have
implemented transaction-oriented e-government applications.
 E-government applications
from different developing countries
• Application area:
– Delivery of services to business and industry
• E-procurement
• New business Registration
• Tax collection (sales tax, and corporate income tax).
• Trade facilitation.
– Increased efficiency within government.
• Use of e-mail and video conferencing.
• Integrated Financial Management System.
– Integrated portals.
• Information and transaction services organized by life events of citizens and
businesses.
– Delivering citizen services.
 Delivering citizen services
• Issue of record of rights of land and mutation of land
records.
• Registration of property Transactions.
• Issue of driving licence and vehicle Registration
• municipal services such as issue of birth and death
certificate, payment of local taxes, etc.
• Passport
• Income tax online.
• Multiple services from local, state and national levels
(bill
• payment, issue of certificates,tax collection).
• Publishing budgets at central and municipal level and
publishing project-wise expenditure.
 Nature of Applications for Different
Types of Clients
Types of Clients
• The list of applications can be divided into three broad
categories
– Delivering information and transaction services to
citizens.
– Delivering services to business and industry and
increased efficiency within the government.
– Delivering services to internal clients (for example,
employees in other departments).
– Some applications serve both citizens and businesses
such as the online tax payments.
 ChallChallenges in Design and
Challenges in Design and Implementation of
E-governmentin Design and Implementation
– Challenges in of
The inadequacy Design and Implementation
ICT infrastructure.
• Most government agencies operate with manual systems
and procedures, making the digitization of archived data a
mammoth task.
• Departments are not interconnected as the networking
infrastructure is weak outside the capital cities and large
urban centres.
• Internet penetration is low and access to broadband is
limited.
• E-government applications have not yet exploited the mobile
phone as a mode of delivering some types of services.
• Often, the design is built around assisted delivery at
community service centres, and the process of delivery is a
hybrid of automated and manual processes.
– For example, the payment processes in most developing countries are
not electronic,Chile and Brazil being exceptions.
• Security provisions have not been adequately handled in
designing systems. So, Security over networks is an
important issue should be considered.
 Investments in E-Government
• Costs of e-government projects depend on the initial conditions:
– whether the application is built from scratch replacing an
existing manual system or an extension of an existing
computerized system.
• Major cost elements are:
– hardware and software at the back-end
– training and maintenance
– communications infrastructure to link the public access
points to the back-end.
• Costs vary quite dramatically according to scope
and type of application.
– Projects involving web publishing may cost in thousands of
dollars (20 to 200).
– whereas online service delivery portals for a country takes
millions of dollars to build.
• Unless inexpensive software developers are available, as in
India and China, it is often more costly to make the software than
to buy it.than to buy it
Table 1: E-government project investment
 Reasons for Implementing E-Government
• Enhance productivity of both the public and private
sectors through using ICT.
• To encourage citizens to move towards self-service to
save cost and time for both citizens and the government.
• To augment basic democratic principles such as citizen
participation:
– Fundamentally altering the outlines of democracy and how
citizens interact with the government.
– These governments involve their citizens in deciding the kind of
services they should offer and the stages through which these
can be delivered.
 Reasons for Implementing E-Government(2)
• Some countries, after experiencing early successes, wish
to be pioneers in the e-government field. These successes
are a source of pride:
– For example, Brazil launched an electronic voting system.
They are proud that it is a better system than that of the
United States.
– There is a competition taking place amongst developing
countries and also with developed countries, which spurs the
development of new applications.
• Governance reform agendas have included e-government
pilots that aim to reduce corruption, increase transparency
and quality of service.
 Reasons for Implementing E-Government(3)
• Governments in the developing world seek to tie e-government with
their overall economic and social development goals.
– For example, in India, alleviation of poverty is an important goal and, therefore,
many applications that deliver services online in rural areas are being tried out in
spite of numerous infrastructural constraints.
• In Latin America, corruption has been a key public issue and,therefore,
e-procurement and transparency in public spending have been
emphasized.
– A number of e-government projects in other countries have also
focused on the reduction of administrative corruption and increase in trans
parency.
(a) reducing the number of intermediaries that citizens need to interact
with in order to get a government Service.
(b) improving government ability to monitor.
(c) disclosing information about government processes and public
budget spending to citizens.
 E-Government Readiness of Countries
• A useful indicator to understand the current status of e-government in a specific
developing country is to compare its e-government readiness rank with countries that
are known to be leaders.
• There are many different e-government readiness indicators that
are published.
– The UNPAN indicator (UNPAN 2008) is published every year, it is used here to
analyze trends.
• Table 2 in the next slide presents the performance of 21 countries (covering the
entire spectrum of development and ICT infrastructure) as a useful benchmark.
– Australia, Canada, US, France and the Republic of Korea are ranked very high in telecommunications
infrastructure and e-government readiness.
– Developing countries in South Asia rank lower on both these indexes and China, Philippines,
Vietnam and Thailand are somewhere in the middle.
– In web presence and e-participation, the two measures that indicate existing e-government activity,
India has done as well as the middle rung country.
– The use of community service centres as opposed to individual access by citizens in India seems to
have enabled India to overcome the handicap of poor performance in telecom infrastructure index.
Table 2: E-Government Readiness of Countries (2)
Benefits of e-Government
Benefits of E-Government for Key Stakeholders
• There are three broad stakeholders who are impacted by the introduction of e-
government:
– Citizens and businesses who access services
– Agencies that deliver services and employees of the agency.
• Positive impacts may be considered as benefits.
• E-government helps in reducing the cost incurred by the citizens and
businesses for obtaining services from the government agencies.
• Citizens need to spend less effort in finding out how a service can be obtained
because such information is available on the websites (publishing rules and
procedures).
• Services can be accessed from homes/offices or delivered to conveniently
located service centres. Citizens have better documentation for follow-up
action. Quick processing time reduces the total time of
• transaction and reduces waiting periods. This also involves fewer visits to
government departments. Improving service delivery to citizens helps
increase the all round productivity by diminishing time wasted in commuting,
standing in queues and seeking information.
Table 3: Potential benefits of E-Government
 Benefits for Citizens:
Results from an Impact Assessment Study
• Many projects from different countries report shorter elapsed time to
complete a transaction from application to the final delivery of
documents (see Table 4).
• These gains come from reducing the number of steps involved,
making each step more efficient and reducing the number of agencies
that need to be consulted.
• Assessment studies of citizen impact of 36 e-government projects in
12 states in India, focusing on three services delivered to citizens,
issue of copies of land record, registration of property and issue of
driver’s licence.
• Report improvements in a number of indicators that determine the
cost of accessing a service.
• The study engaged 11 market research agencies. Each agency was
assigned the three projects in a given state in which they surveyed
nearly 800 citizens being serviced by 16 service delivery points for
each project.
Table 4: Examples of reduction in elapsed time
Table
Table 5: Number of trips required for availing service
across all three applicationsf trips required for
availing service across all three
applications
Table
Table 5: Number of trips required for availing service
across all three applicationsf(2) trips required for
availing service across all three
applications
Table 6: Impact on key dimensions averaging over all states
 Benefits for Businesses:
Results from an Impact Assessment Study
• There are several areas where e-government can have potential
economic impact.
• E-government can increase the competitiveness of a nation by
reducing the costs of setting up and operating an enterprise.
• The costs of setting up an enterprise can be reduced by making
the process of business registration, issue of a variety of licences
and provision of services fast, efficient and corruption free.
• In India, the Department of Company Affairs launched a project
called MCA21 which enables new companies to be registered
and existing companies to file annual returns without having to
visit the departments’ offices.
– All transactions (uploading document, making payments, accessing
information and filing returns) can be done through their portal.
Table 7: MCA21 e-governance project
dimensions
Table 8: Impactacross three across
on key dimensions
projects three projects

projectsv
 Benefits for Agencies Implementing
E-Government Applications
• E-government can make a significant impact on
government finances.
• Leakage in government revenues can be plugged by
making tax collection services efficient.
• Transparent and efficient delivery of services connected
with economic activity can stimulate production growth by
correcting the incentive structure.
– For example, a fair payment system for procurement of milk
and farm produce in rural areas.
– removal of intermediaries from the procurement process can
provide the incentive for increasing investments in productive
resources and improving yields.
 Benefits for Agencies Implementing
E-Government Applications(2)
• Cost Reduction in Service Delivery
– to save the high employee cost.
• The effort of entering data in records is shifted from employees to the users
in e-governance applications and it works to the advantage of both parties.
• Such savings can accrue in the long run when services delivered through
portals can cover a large proportion of the population.
• Control of Government Expenditure
– Many countries have implemented Integrated Financial
Management Systems (IFMS) to track and control payments
made out of government treasuries.
– E-procurement systems are often designed to save total cost
of procurement.
– Another strategy to control expenditure is to introduce paperless
offices in large government departments.
• For example, Inland Revenue Authority of Singapore (IRAS) has been able
to save paper costs by continuously encouraging more tax payers to file
online.
 Benefits for Agencies Implementing
E-Government Applications(3)
• Collecting Revenues from Service Fee
– With a large push for public–private partnership (PPP) in implementing e-
government, it is perceived that additional revenues can be raised to set off
investment and operational costs through a transaction fee charged for e-delivery
of services.
– Experience has shown that even rural poor citizens are willing to pay a
reasonable fee for a useful service
• For example, a bank customer pay a transaction fee of L.E. 15 for receiving a signed
copy of his account.
• Growth of Tax Revenue
• The inefficient collection of taxes in many developing countries has led to the
increasing use of ICTs in tax collection agencies.
• Moreover, corruption in the collection process leads to less money going to
the government and a lack of public confidence in the system.
• Modernizing tax systems through e-government applications has been a
priority for many countries.
• Through online tax filing and processing system, governments aim to
reduce corruption and enhance transparency to create more public trust.
 Benefits for Agencies Implementing
E-Government Applications(4)
• Employee’s Perceptions of Impact of E-Government
– Although it is widely believed that e-government will enhance employee
performance because it permits better management and analysis of data, actual
measurement of impact on employees is not easily available.
– There was a strong perception of improvement in all dimensions of governance
among supervisors (see Table 9)
– About two-thirds of all respondents indicated significant positive impact on
transparency, corruption and the level of discretion to deny services.
– Nearly half of the respondents indicated a significant positive impact on
accountability, the presence of intermediaries and the effectiveness of the
complaint-handling mechanism.
– There was a positive impact on the quality of information handling. More than
two-thirds of the respondents perceived an improvement in the accuracy of data,
traceability of transactions and effectiveness of disaster-recovery measures.
– Supervisors believed that their effectiveness in monitoring subordinates,
decision-making and policy formulation had been enhanced.
– Most supervisors reported that the extent of re-engineering and integration of
services was only moderate during the computerization process, yet the impact
on achievement of overall organizational goals is perceived as being significantly
positive.
aPerception of supervisors about
impact on agency (in percentage)
 Arrays
• There are three types of arrays:
– Indexed arrays
• Arrays with a numeric index
– Associative arrays
• Arrays with named keys
– Multidimensional arrays
• Arrays containing one or more arrays
• In PHP, the array() function is used to create
an array:
– array();
 Indexed Arrays
(Program Example)
1. <?php
2. $cars = array("Volvo", "BMW", "Toyota");
3. $fruits[0] = “Mangoes";
4. $fruits[1] = “Bananas";
5. $fruits[2] = “Apples";
6. echo "I like " . $cars[0] . ", " . $cars[1] . " and
" . $cars[2] . ".";
7. echo "I like " . $fruits [0] . ", " . $fruits [1] .
" and " . $fruits [2] . ".";
8. Arrlength = count($cars); // Length of the array
9. for($x = 0; $x < $arrlength; $x++) {   
10. echo $cars[$x];   
11. echo "<br>";
12.}
13.?>
 Associative Arrays
(Program Example)
1. <?php
2. $age = array("Peter"=>"35", "Ben"=>"37",
"Joe"=>"43");
3. /* another method
4. $age['Peter'] = "35";
5. $age['Ben'] = "37";
6. $age['Joe'] = "43";
7. */
8. echo "Peter is " . $age['Peter'] . " years old.";
9. ?>
 Sorting Arrays
1. The elements in an array can be sorted in
alphabetical or numerical order, descending or
ascending.
2. Sort Functions For Arrays:
1. sort() - sort arrays in ascending order
2. rsort() - sort arrays in descending order
3. asort() - sort associative arrays in ascending order, according to the
value
4. ksort() - sort associative arrays in ascending order, according to the
key
5. arsort() - sort associative arrays in descending order, according to
the value
6. krsort() - sort associative arrays in descending order, according to
the key
 Sorting Arrays(2)
Program Example
1. <?php
2. $cars = array("Volvo", "BMW", "Toyota");
3. $numbers = array(4, 6, 2, 22, 11);
4. $age = array("Peter"=>"35", "Ben"=>"37",
"Joe"=>"43");
5. sort($cars);
6. rsort($numbers);
7. asort($age);
8. ksort($age);
9. arsort($age);
10.krsort($age);
11.?>
 PHP Forms
(Example 1)
1. <?php
2. if( $_POST["name"] || $_POST["age"] )
3. {
4. echo "Welcome ". $_POST['name']. "<br />";
5. echo "You are ". $_POST['age']. " years old.";
6. exit();
7. }

8. ?>

9. <html>
10.<body>
11.<form action="<?php $_PHP_SELF ?>" method="POST">
12.Name: <input type="text" name="name" />
13.Age: <input type="text" name="age" />
14.<input type="submit" />
15.</form>
16.</body>
17.</html>
 PHP Forms
1. <html>
(Example 2)
2. <head>
3. <title>Change Case</title>

4. <?PHP
5. $full_name = 'bill gates';

6. if (isset($_POST['Submit1'])) {
7.

8. $full_name = $_POST['username'];

9. $full_name = ucwords($full_name);
10. }
11. ?>

12. </head>
13. <body>

14. <FORM NAME ="form1" METHOD ="POST" ACTION ="changeCase.php">

15. <INPUT TYPE = 'TEXT' Name ='username' value="<?PHP print $full_name; ?>" >
16. <INPUT TYPE = "Submit" Name = "Submit1" VALUE = "Login">
17. </FORM>

18. </body>
19. </html>
 PHP Forms
(Example 3)
1. <html>
2. <head>
3. <title>A Times Table Programme</title>

4. <?PHP
5. $times = 2;

6. if (isset($_POST['Submit1'])) {

7. $start = $_POST['txtStart'];
8. $end = $_POST['txtEnd'];
9. $times = $_POST['txtTimes'];

10. for($start; $start <= $end; $start++) {

11. $answer = $start * $times;
12. print $start . " multiplied by " . $times . " = " . $answer .
"<BR>";
13. }
14. }

15. ?>
16. </head>
 PHP Forms
(Example 3(2))
16. <body>

17. <FORM NAME = frmOne Method = "POST" Action = "timesTable.php">

18. Start Number: <INPUT TYPE = Text NAME = txtStart SIZE = 5 value ="1">
19. End Number: <INPUT TYPE = Text NAME = txtEnd SIZE = 5 value ="10">
20. Multiply By: <INPUT TYPE = Text NAME = txtTimes SIZE = 5 value = <?PHP print
$times; ?> >
21. <P>
22. <INPUT TYPE = Submit Name = Submit1 VALUE = "Do Times Table">
23. <P>

24. </FORM>
25. </body>

26. <html>
Thank You