Digital public infrastructure (DPI) refers to the common, foundational digital systems that enable the delivery of services in the digital age. Elements of DPI can be developed by the public or private sector, or co-developed to benefit the delivery and access to services across both sectors, and eventually across borders. DPI needs to be standards-based and re-usable.
The seven Latin American and Caribbean (LAC) countries surveyed have made mixed progress in establishing DPI at the central/federal government level in 2022. LAC countries outperform the OECD in key areas, including the adoption of interoperability frameworks (adopted by all LAC countries compared to 91% of OECD ones) and shared networks (adopted by six LAC countries, or 86%, compared to 82% of OECD countries), which are crucial for communication and data exchange across government agencies. Other elements of DPI are less widespread: four LAC countries (57%) have common digital payment solutions (similar to OECD countries at 55%). Furthermore, three of the seven LAC countries have digital tools to notify users during the process of accessing a service (43%) compared to 55% of OECD countries and only two each (29%) have implemented metadata management and base registry frameworks, compared to 61% and 64% of OECD countries respectively (Figure 9.3).
Digital identity is a core pillar of DPI, but systems in LAC countries do not provide wide enough access to public services or promote cross-sector interoperability. National digital identity systems only enable access to half or more online public services in four of the seven surveyed LAC countries (57%), compared to 73% of OECD countries (Online Figure F.6.1). Digital identity governance could be reinforced in LAC countries to secure the trusted use of digital identities across sectors. While six out of the seven surveyed LAC countries have a body or ministry responsible for digital identity, only in Brazil does the mandate cover both the public sector and the wider digital economy, which is the case in 64% of OECD countries (Figure 9.4). This indicates a critical opportunity for LAC countries to establish more robust and comprehensive digital identity frameworks, empowering users beyond simply accessing government services.
Other types of digital public infrastructure, such as cloud infrastructure, are relevant to enabling the digital transformation of governments at scale. Making this infrastructure available to public institutions enhances efficiency and scalability when digitalising government processes and services. Of the surveyed LAC countries, only Argentina has a dedicated cloud infrastructure strategy for the public sector, compared to 36% of OECD countries. However, four (57%) have included the adoption of cloud infrastructure within their national digital government strategies to enable scalable government services, compared to 24% of OECD countries (Figure 9.5). When looking at specific cloud solutions, LAC countries lag behind their OECD counterparts; only three each (43%) provide cloud computing (compared to 64% of OECD countries), platform as a service (67%) and software as a service initiative (61%) (Online Figure F.6.2). This shows the need for greater efforts to translate strategies into concrete solutions.
