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The Interchange of Data Between Administration (IDA) workplan was created by the European Commission, and is revised each year, as a way to help governments across the EU connect their "back offices" and well as their public facing e-government services, explained European Commission spokesperson Per Haugaard.
For instance, schemes within the plan should make it easier for telecoms regulatory bodies, such as the ODTR in Ireland, Oftel in the UK and OPTA in the Netherlands to connect their electronic systems and e-government related services with each other, particularly when dealing with issues that have a pan-European impact.
The plan includes actions that are designed to promote electronic interaction among EU citizens, as well as among enterprises and governments. The approval of the latest version of the scheme also marks the start of "large-scale involvement" of EU expansion candidate countries in IDA projects, the European Commission said on Monday.
Seventy separate actions form the core of the plan, with healthcare, consumer protection and internal market issues that impact multiple member state governments the primary concern of most projects.
One such project is SOLVIT, which according to the EC will help resolve problems caused by the misapplication of EU community law regarding internal market freedoms. Another such project is SySex, which will help the mutual recognition of diplomas in the health sector. Details of more schemes will be published in the coming months, Haugaard said.
"Essentially it (the IDA plan) is focusing on the interchange of data between member governments, especially in areas that relate to common EU laws," said Haugaard. "This whole thing about e-government has taken the forefront as part of the E-Europe 2005 Action plan."
In fact all of the IDA projects stem from the e-Europe initiative, which in part is set to resolve concerns about European interoperability of national government services available on the Net. The IDA plan itself aims to provide an interoperability framework for these pan-European e-services.
One of these interoperability frameworks will be the Portal of the EU Administration, which will provide access to public information and services related to personal and business life events with cross-border implications. This will be complemented by activities in support of electronic procurement.
The IDA communication platform (TESTA II) for data exchanges between European public authorities is also being upgraded, the EC said, to improve reliability and data security.
Notably, EU enlargement candidate countries participated in the preparation of this year's work programme. The IDA programme is likely to be formally opened to most candidate countries in the coming months, once memoranda of understanding have been signed and IDA's legal basis has been amended.
For more detailed information visit the IDA Web site.
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