ELECTRONIC COMMERCE - popularly defined as the use of documents in electronic form for carrying out functions of business that require interchange of information, obligations, or monetary value between organisations - is more than a recent "buzz concept" within the private sector.
Widely recognised as the critical life-line of organisations that intend to survive within a globalised commercial environment, e-commerce now also encompasses a whole new area that has evolved to take its own rightful place in the mix; this is the area of e-government.
Public sector entities the world over, are beginning to acknowledge that they too must change their operational methods to ensure the delivery of better services to their citizens, while also ensuring that they provide additional means for delivering swift and accurate information to people, and accommodate feedback. It is within this e-government context that the recent launch of the Planning Institute of Jamaica's web site takes on new dimensions.
Described by the site's designer, Info Exchange Limited, as "a truly an Online Business site", the facility allows PIOJ to use the Internet to enhance its present business operation by significantly increasing the efficiency - at decreasing cost - of disseminating information. According to David Allen, chief executive officer of Info Exchange, "The PIOJ web site is an extension of one component of PIOJ's business on to the web - that component being the timely dissemination of accurate information." He adds that, overall, the PIOJ site should prove of significant value to investors, bankers, international funding agencies, economists, and the public at large.
The proof of this is reflected in the sections of the organisation's operations on which the site focuses. They include the creation of a special database of their publications, online, that enable users to browse and select/purchase the publications of their choice.
The site also facilitates the dissemination of information about the status of various externally-funded projects. "The software we've provided enables users to search a database for project details - a very useful facility since the external funding agencies, the various contractors and project managers, as well as the Government and the public at large can keep abreast of the status of each project," Mr. Allen says. Importantly also, the PIOJ will be able to use this feature in the future to disseminate information about projects that are up for tender.
Other critical features comprise the provision of on-line access to Socio-Economic Performance reports such as, GDP.
and Income, Inflation, Population, Labour Market, and Fiscal Policy - reports that would normally have had to be printed and disseminated manually; and the enabling of online discussions through a Discussion Forum.
"What makes this site particularly unique," David Allen adds, "is that all databases and dynamic content is totally managed by the PIOJ through online administrative tools specially-developed for that purpose. The operation of these tools are intuitive and require no programming knowledge."
The site that was launched actually represents Phase I of the electronic solution being provided for PIOJ - with Info Exchange slated to develop additional functionality to further integrate other Line of Business operations within PIOJ.
