Why it has some of the digital governments | EUROtoday

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Ben Morris

Technology of Business Editor

Getty Images A woman works at her laptop in a cafe in UkraineGetty Images

Ukrainians can entry 130 providers from the Diia portal

Rounding a nook in Kyiv on 24 Feb 2022, Oleksandr Bornyakov remembers driving right into a gun battle.

It was day considered one of Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine, and Russian saboteurs had been combating with Ukrainian safety forces within the centre of the Ukrainian capital.

“There is shooting, cars are burning, armoured vehicles are burning… when we eventually passed… there were a lot of bodies.”

As a authorities minister he had been ordered to drive lots of of kilometres west and proceed his work in a safer location.

Beginning in 2019, Bornykov, Deputy Minister of Digital Transformation, had been managing the shift of Ukraine’s authorities providers to a brand new app known as Diia (the Ukrainian phrase for motion).

The concept was that residents may entry all the things they wanted from their cellphones; driving licences, marriage certificates, home deeds, and rather more.

They began with driver’s licences in 2019, which was fairly common, however the Diia app received a lift throughout the pandemic, when Covid certificates had been added.

“This gave another maybe two or three million people,” says Bornykov.

Despite the struggle Diia has continued to develop.

Today the app hosts 40 authorities providers, together with tax fee, automotive registration and marriage purposes.

Perhaps extra enjoyable – Ukrainians could make native picks for Eurovision through the app, together with choosing nationwide jury members and selecting the nationwide consultant.

Additionally, 30 paperwork can be found on the app; Bornykov, flicked by way of a few of his for me together with his gun licence and automotive insurance coverage.

There can also be a Diia portal, which could be accessed through a browser on a pc, which has 130 providers for residents and companies.

In whole Diia has 22.7 million customers.

All this, in keeping with Bornyakov, makes Ukraine one of many main nations relating to digital authorities providers – in his opinion placing Ukraine forward of Estonia, which is well-known for its digital authorities.

“I haven’t seen anybody else doing better than us, except maybe Saudi Arabia, and this both relates to number of users and and the approach.”

Ministry of Digital Transformation Ukraine A couple appear to be kissing but one blocks the view with a phone showing the Diia appMinistry of Digital Transformation Ukraine

Marriage admin can all be executed through the Diia app

How has Ukraine been in a position to make such progress, regardless of the disruption of Covid and amid, for the final three years, combating off Russian invaders?

Part of it’s having the best workforce, in keeping with Bornyakov.

He says that for the previous 20 years Ukraine has been a preferred vacation spot for corporations seeking to outsource IT tasks.

He estimates that there are 300,000 software program builders in Ukraine, lots of whom have labored on complicated tasks for giant worldwide corporations.

“There’s a lot of technical and experienced engineers that can do brilliant things,” he says.

They are additionally not as costly as elsewhere on the planet. So, he estimates that between 5 and 10 million {dollars} was spent on creating Diia.

Hiring software program builders within the UK would value 5 or 10 occasions as a lot, he says.

Getty Images Ukrainian band Ziferblat representing Ukraine with the song "Bird of Pray" at Eurovision 2025.Getty Images

The Diia app was used to pick out Ukraine’s Eurovision act, Ziferblat

David Eaves is affiliate professor of digital authorities at University College London, and has studied efforts by governments all around the world to digitise their providers.

He says the important thing to Ukraine’s success was work executed previous to constructing the app. Using software program much like that utilized by Estonia, Ukraine created an information change, which made it straightforward for information stream from authorities departments and organisations.

The Diia app was then added on prime of the info change.

“If you have this flexibility of moving data around, it becomes much easier to build new services, because rather than asking citizens for the same information all over again, you can simply request their permission to access it,” says Prof Eaves.

So, when making use of for a profit, customers do not should re-enter their tackle, native land, martial standing, and their earnings might be checked towards their tax data.

Not solely does this scale back the executive burden, however it means the federal government would not should design a system to remember, retailer and course of this data another time.

Ministry for Digital Transformation Ukraine A phone showing a document on the Diia appMinistry for Digital Transformation Ukraine

The Diia app hosts 40 authorities providers and 30 paperwork

That flexibility allowed Ukraine so as to add new providers to deal with the challenges of struggle.

“We actually introduced around 15 different services related to the to the war,” says Mr Bornyakov.

For instance customers may apply for compensation if their property was broken or destroyed. Citizens may additionally report the placement of Russian troops by way of the app.

Prof Eaves additionally factors out that Ukraine’s struggle with Russia has spurred authorities to modernise.

“When you are on a wartime footing, there’s a sense of urgency. The urgency of delivering the service becomes more important than rules that sometimes trip up bureaucracies,” he says.

That’s put Ukraine among the many nations main the hassle to digitise authorities providers, in keeping with Prof Eaves.

He thinks Denmark might be main the best way with each a stable infrastructure, vary of providers and properly designed consumer interface.

So what does the long run maintain? Ukraine is creating AI techniques which Bornyakov says have the potential to make interactions with authorities smoother.

He sees AI guiding a consumer by way of the varied steps to get what they need.

“We want to redefine the approach to government services,” he says.

While Prof Eaves is happy about the potential of AI in authorities providers, he advises warning.

Developers have to be positive they’ve dependable information to coach the AI after which make sure the system can study what the best solutions are.

“AI is like having a Ferrari. You can do amazing things, but you better have good roads. Pretty hard to drive a Ferrari on a dirt road, right?”

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