(an excerpt from the book “Electronic Economy in Poland – 2005 Report”, prepared by the Institute of Logistics and Warehousing)
Limited citizen access to the Internet (6.8 percent) and the lack of common standards for document exchange (6.4 percent) were identified by offices as significant factors hindering the development of e-government. The former factor was indicated by approximately 5 to 6 percent of all offices, while awareness of the lack of standards was slightly higher in the group of central, marshal, and voivodeship offices (7-8 percent) than in the group II offices (5-6 percent). The low level of citizen education in modern information technologies was also recognized by offices as a factor hindering the development process and was indicated more frequently by district offices (starostwos), cities with district status, and municipalities, likely because people working in local public administration offices encounter this problem more often than officials working in large institutions in large urban centers. Compared to 2004, the percentage of offices with their own unit responsible for computerization increased slightly (by 2.6 percentage points). Such a unit was present in less than half of the surveyed offices (43.7 percent). Conversely, the percentage of offices using the services of external companies for IT support fell by 6.3 percentage points. At the same time, the number of offices that developed software in-house decreased (from 9.5 percent to 7.7 percent). This may result from the fact that, similar to 2004, in January 2005, in the majority of offices (2004 – 67 percent, 2005 – 69.6 percent), IT support was handled by one person. In the case of 3/4 of group I offices, the number of people employed in the IT unit was four or more, however, these offices indicated a lack of financial resources as a barrier to e-government development to a lesser extent. In the case of group II offices, 73 percent of offices employed only one person dealing with IT support.
The article comes from the magazine “e-Fakty” 5/2006.