The use of ICT in the public sector is fundamental to serve the needs of citizens and businesses, and can bring governments closer to their citizens and businesses and enhance transparency. Transparency and better accessibility to services increases trust in government.
The EU eGovernment Benchmark is a monitoring instrument provided by the European Commission that aims to assess the use of ICT in the public sector. The EU eGovernment benchmark evaluates the maturity of online public services in three key domains: user centricity, transparency, and use of key enablers. In addition, it considers the dimension of cross-border service delivery that measures how online services serve citizens cross-borders.
The most recent EU eGovernment benchmark shows that the countries in the Western Balkan region are lagging behind in terms of overall maturity of the use of ICT in public sector. This implies that some essential online government services are not in place; it is difficult to find information online on government services; and they are not available outside the country. In 2017-2018, the Western Balkan average stood at 41%, significantly below the OECD-EU average of 70%. There is no significant difference in the overall score across countries in the Western Balkan region. The overall score varies from 37% (North Macedonia) to 44% (Albania).
In terms of user centricity (including online availability, usability and mobile friendliness), the region scores 65% on average, that is 23 p.p. below the OECD-EU average. Albania has the highest level in user centricity in the region (74%), because of high scores in usability of the online services provided by the government and in mobile friendliness of the online public services. The Albanian scores in these two domains is higher than in the OECD-EU average. Among the four Western Balkans, Montenegro has the lowest overall score in user centricity of public services (59%). Mobile friendliness of the online services could be enhanced in Montenegro as the country ranks the lowest in Europe in that category.
The EU eGovernment benchmark indicator on transparent government is an average of transparency in service delivery, transparency in public organisations and transparency in personal data. In 2017-2018, the countries comprising the Western Balkan region scored 43% in transparent government while the OECD-EU average was 66%. Albania has the highest score in this domain (45%) while Serbia reported the lowest scores (40%). Especially transparency in service delivery (17%) could be improved in Serbia.
When looking at the scores for cross-border mobility, which captures how users of public services from another country can use digital public services, business mobility is higher than citizen mobility, both in the countries of the Western Balkan region and OECD-EU countries. Citizen mobility is rated at 21% in the countries of the Western Balkan region and at 50% in OECD-EU countries. Business mobility stands at 38% in the region and 67% in the OECD-EU. Montenegro has the highest rate of citizen mobility in the region and North Macedonia performs best in terms of business mobility. Albania has the lowest score in citizen mobility (1%) as two out four criteria are not in place, namely cross-border e-identification and e-documents.
In line with the other domains of the EU eGovernment benchmark, countries in the Western Balkan region score at the bottom end of the scale in key enabling factors of the use of ICT in public services such as the use of e-identification or digital post service. The largest gap (44 p.p.) between the average regional performance and OECD-EU countries is found in the key enablers category. Within the region, there is significant variation, from only 6% in North Macedonia to 28% in Albania.
