Mary Wallace (Meath East, Fianna Fail)

The successes of e-Government in this country have been well recognised and this is acknowledged by the Comptroller and Auditor General. Indeed, some of our e-Government services are recognised as world-leading. At the start of this decade, the Government, recognising the opportunities presented by newer technology, particularly Internet technologies, mandated all Government organisations to produce an e-Government strategy for their particular organisation. This mandate, combined with the information society fund, triggered a wide range of e-Government initiatives, many of which were spectacularly successful.

The Department of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food has been extremely successful in this area and the Comptroller and Auditor General has recognised our success. This has led to better customer service, greater internal efficiency and more effective control. The Department provides a wide range of services through the Internet to farmers, fishermen, foresters and agri-food business. For a number of years the Department has also recognised and exploited mobile phone-based services. We are pleased to note that a growing number of our customers have seen the value and convenience of doing business through the Department's electronic services and are signing up for these services.

E-Government in its fullest sense has facilitated the streamlining of our business processes and put us to the forefront among EU agriculture administrations. For example, we are at the very forefront in CAP payment delivery. Ireland delivers the vast majority of its direct CAP payments at the earliest dates allowable by the EU.

We have traceability of our animals that stands comparison with the very best in the world. We use web-based technology in our disease eradication programme to streamline and integrate the processes of the Department and those of the private veterinary practices. Almost 100% of private veterinary practices now interact electronically with the Department. This has led to significant efficiencies for both the Department and the private vets, as referred to by the Minister of State, Deputy Tom Kitt. It means that better disease information is available and animals can be cleared for sale more quickly.

In the area of forestry, the process is underpinned by technology from application through approval to electronic grant payments. We can now make premium payments earlier than ever. Forestry companies can avail of on-line mapping facilities that assist them in accurately preparing planting applications and in avoiding applications for ineligible land. Likewise, in regard to fisheries, sales notes are captured directly on-line, leading to simpler administration for the Department and the industry.

In the area of CAP payments and agriculture exports, my Department has worked with the Revenue to integrate its processes, with the result that exporters need submit their information electronically only once. This information flows all the way through both the customs processes and the export refunds processes of my Department, through to electronic payment of export refunds.

E-Government practice worldwide has matured greatly, going from web-based provision of general information to the next level whereby customers can access their own information at a higher level and transact business via the Internet. While early initiatives were at the information provision end of the scale, some of the larger Government organisations progressed quickly to the top end of the scale, providing full transaction capability. In such cases, greater efficiency is being achieved where the public face of e-Government services are integrated into internal business processes. In this way, information that is provided can be checked to prevent customer errors. In many cases, information that has already been collected is reused so that the customer does not have to provide it again.

To this end, the Department has structured its information systems around a single view of the customer, a single view of the farm animal and a single view of the land. We will continue to seek out new opportunities to optimise our internal processes and our interactions with customers and with other Departments. This will enable us to improve customer services and reduce costs for both the Department and the customer.

See this speech in context