By ADAM GIFFORD
The Government's attempt to rapidly develop an e-government strategy is on a par with what is happening around the world, says consulting firm KPMG.
Its new study of electronic government, Managing the Public Sector - Global Challenges, was based on interviews with 97 national, regional and city government chief executives from Australia, Canada, France, Germany, the Netherlands, South Africa, Britain and the United States, and included 15 from New Zealand.
"We're not out of step," said Rebecca Boyack, of KPMG New Zealand. "What New Zealand is doing and the issues it is facing are consistent with governments around the world."A lot of countries have had problems with runaway projects like Incis, so we are not alone."
The internet had opened opportunities for low-cost collaboration between agencies rather than the big, database-driven projects of the past.
Ms Boyack said KPMG was learning from its partnership with networking giant Cisco, which had a golden rule that if a project could not be done in 90 days, it should be stopped and rescoped.
In the KPMG study, 80 per cent of respondents said their governments provided information electronically through web sites.
The study showed that 59 per cent said their organisations provided "basic interactivity" such as communicating with customers and suppliers by e-mail or tailoring information according to the internet user's postal code.
Only 39 per cent said they processed simple on-line transactions such as order taking and on-line payments, but 38 per cent said they would invest in smart card technology and 27 per cent reported plans for e-cash technology.
Security was a major concern, with 82 per cent of the government leaders reporting their organisations had implemented firewall technologies.
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