The Government of Dominica, Grenada, St. Vincent and St. Lucia have secured financing from the International Development Association (IDA) of the World Bank for the implementation of the OECS Electronic Government Regional Integration Project (EGRIP).
The objective of EGRIP is to promote efficiency, quality, and transparency of public services through the delivery of regionally integrated e-government applications that take advantages of economies of scale.
Among the objectives of component one of the OECS-EGRIP are to strengthen and harmonize national and regional e-government processes, operational ICT platforms and framework and to promote more efficient regionally-based ICT development and capacity.
To achieve these objectives, the OECS-EGRIP contracted Eagles Computer Technology, from St. Vincent and the Grenadines under a World Bank open tender process to supply and install video conferencing equipment for the Commonwealth of Dominica.
Video Conferencing involves various telecommunication technologies which allow interaction among two or more locations via two way video and audio transmissions simultaneously. It is expected that the video conferencing equipment would have numerous benefits to the Government of Dominica. These may include productivity gains achieved as a direct result of being able to instantly share information and make quicker decisions, substantial economic savings achieved due to reduced travel costs and time savings realized through a reduction of downtime.
The state of the art video conferencing equipment will be utilized by the various Ministries, Departments or Agencies of the Government of the Commonwealth of Dominica.
The official handing over ceremony for the video conferencing equipment is carded for Friday, October 21, 2011 at 2:30pm at the Public Service Training Center.
Video conferencing has been around for at least 25 years as far as I know so we are only just catching up. But,better late than never. In my experience it does not cut down on travel or other, related expenses. That argument was used in its infancy to justify the not inconsiderable cost. It is a very useful, additional tool and I trust it is made available to all goverment departments.
lol alas we so behind the times..third world country for real…jah
I wonder if that was all Parry Bellot’s idea – Productivity consultant at work. I hope all the tax payer money wasted on traveling delegations will be curtailed. The overblown expenses , the special delivery night companions( I know what I’m saying) , expensive dinners etc. By the way can we get an account of Parry bellot’s achievements since becoming productivity consultant and we would also like to know whether t is still on the cabinet payroll. We would also like to know what it is that Maynard and the other advisers are getting paid for.
I am a tax payer and have a right to ask the questions..
The EGRIP Project percedes Parry’s appointment as Productivity Consultant