Helani Galpaya
Director, Strategic Development, LIRNEasia
Helani Galpaya is Director of Strategic Development at LIRNEasia, a think tank that works across the Asia-Pacific. At LIRNEasia she is leading the research and advocacy work in the areas of e-Government, ICTs in agriculture markets, measurement of the Telecom Regulatory Environment and the use of indicator data to benchmark sector performance. Prior to LIRNEasia she worked on the e-Sri Lanka initiative at the ICT Agency of Sri Lanka, where among other things, she implemented e-government projects, including the currently-operational Government Information Center (GIC or 1919 call center). Before that she spent a number of years in management consulting in the United States. She has a MS in Technology Policy from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
1. First, Can you tell us about the organization that you work for?
LIRNEasia’s mission is “to improve the lives of the people of the emerging Asia-Pacific by facilitating their use of ICTs and related infrastructures; by catalyzing the reform of laws policies and regulations to enable those uses through the conduct of policy-relevant research, training and advocacy with emphasis on building in-situ expertise”. So at its heart, LIRNEasia’s aim is to advance evidence-based policy making and regulation in the ICT sector in Asia Pacific. In order to achieve this, we do several things. First we do research that is timely, high quality and policy-relevant. Second we spend a lot of energy getting this research (the “evidence”) in front of the relevant stakeholders (this includes policy makers, the private sector operators and those that influence them such as the media). This is so that they are able to use our data in making sound policies or developing new products and services that increase peoples’ access and use of ICTs. And finally we to engage in capacity building work for policy makers, regulators and operators.
In doing all this, our focus is the poor, or more specifically those at Bottom of the Pyramid (or BOP, defined as those belonging to socio-economic classifications D and E). We believe ICTs can help make their lives better.
2. Is your organization also working in the field of e-government?
As an organization our primary focus is on making the livelihoods of those at the Bottom of the Pyramid (BOP) better, through the use of ICTs. Citizens, specially the BOP need to be able to access government services transparently and at low cost, because the lack of transparency and high cost affect the poor disproportionately, given their low incomes. E-Gov promises to both. How do citizens at the BOP access e-Gov services? What are policy and regulatory barriers to them using such services? What is the best way to deliver e-Gov services to them? Are current policies appropriate in ensuring that those at the BOP are able to reap the benefits of e-Gov? These are some of the questions we try to address in our research. In this sense, e-Gov is within our core research and advocacy area. We will research, and work with citizens, policy makers and implanters in order to answer these questions. However, we do not directly implement e-Gov systems.
3. What are the global trends in e-Government and what are the opportunities and challenges of e-Government in developing countries?
I think the need for, and benefits of, e-Government are generally established and accepted by now. Funds spent on e-Gov initiatives is on the increase. The developed countries have been implementing e-Gov solutions for much longer than the developing countries. This enables us (the developing countries) to learn from the mistakes made by others. In addition, technology is changing fast and becoming cheaper. Therefore developing countries have some opportunity to leap-frog – not only catching up to developed countries, but also to provide better solutions to citizens. However the challenge for us is to adopt the western (developed world) e-Gov models and solutions so that they are appropriate to our cultural, governance and economic structures.
4. Imperative data show that majority of e-government projects in developing counties fail. What do you think is the main reason behind this occurrence?
In general the concept of e-Gov comes from the developed world – where labor is expensive (and therefore replacing some labor with technology is sensible), where internet is available to a majority of the population (therefore expecting citizens to interact with government via the internet is feasible) and banking and credit cards are commonly used (therefore citizens making/receiving government payments online is realistic). In developing countries these 3 conditions are not satisfied: labor is relatively cheap (and technology for e-Gov, which comes from the developed countries is more expensive on a relative, purchasing power parity basis), the internet barely reaches the top economic classes of society and only a small percentage of the population has access to banking and credit card facilities. It is in this environment that developing countries implement e-Gov. So apart from the “usual” problems of e-Gov (naturally emanating from any attempt to change the way governments think and work), developing countries face additional barriers.
Of course there is also the constant accusation of corruption – in some countries this may be a factor. The lack of political will, or more importantly constantly changing government policies that come about as a result of frequent power-changes in governments of developing countries is also a factor.
5. What are the change management issues in implementing e-Government projects in developing countries? How can they be overcome?
I think the core set change management issues faced anywhere are the same, and they are significant. However, around these core issues, developing countries perhaps face additional peripheral challenges. These are often country or region-specific. For example, the lack of very basic computer literacy among government employees is a challenge in developing countries. So is the lack of competent IT specialists and managers within government, given the booking IT outsourcing markets in India and Sri Lanka, as an example. These impact the ability to manage change as well as to implement change.
6. What is your opinion regarding importance of publicity and awareness generation among the public about e-Government services?
In general, publicity is a required element of citizen-centric (G2C) e-Gov projects. People need to know about a service in order to use it. But publicity has to be handled with care. Too much publicity without the corresponding service level improvements can have the opposite effect, and create a negative cycle where trust in new e-Gov systems decline.
7. What role can the public-private partnerships play in e-Government project implementation in developing countries?
The private sector is even more crucial to developing countries (when compared to developed countries). The financial resources available to developing countries are limited, and many depend on multilateral and bi-lateral donor funds that have to be repaid. There are always competing priorities for these funds: it is hard to justify why a government should spend its funds on IT systems when clean drinking water and immunization programs are being demanded by the public. Limited funds can, and should, be channeled towards the latter (drinking water, immunization), because if the government doesn’t do it, no one else will. However, the funding-gap in IT can be bridged by the private sector. Experience has shown that the private sector is able and willing to participate in such projects. Even from a competency point of view, the private sector is way ahead in the use of IT, in implementing IT systems, in marketing them and in coming up with innovative financing solutions to fund them. Therefore their abilities should be utilized to bring best-practices into e-Gov. Of course they expect a reasonable return on investment in order participate in the provision of e-Gov services, and there are many options (BOO, BOOT and so on) that can be explored for this purpose. They can be successful if the right balance of risk and reward is met for both parties. I’m not saying this is easy – but for developing countries this is the only way to increase the number of e-Services offered to citizens.
8. Please tell us briefly about the future plans of LIRNEasia in the areas of e-government?
Our recent Teleuse@ the Bottom of the Pyramid survey we know that the mobile phone is the only device in the hands of the poor. Our next research cycle starts in April 2008. The main theme is “Mobile 2.0”, where we will explore the phenomenon (and potential) of the mobile phone delivering more than communication services to the masses at the Bottom of the Pyramid. Obviously, government content and services are a big part of that. It is not only a tool for e-Government, but for e-governance. Therefore both the qualitative (case study and focus group based) and quantitative (large sample survey based) parts of our new research will have e-Gov as a topic . We will work in about 6 – 9 countries in South Asia and South East Asia in depth.