The Government Information Center

To create proactive institutional, policy, and regulatory environments that are supportive of ICT reform and development for government and the nation as a whole.

Description

As the apex body for ICT development, ICTA will act as a policy setter and direction giver in the field of ICT. Currently ICTA has prepared a National ICT policy and an ICT policy for Government.

The ICT policy for Government acts as a guide for Government in using ICTs to achieve overall development within agencies and in the delivery of services. It will assist in benchmarking each organizations activities against the Policy, which will enable agencies to identify the areas which need attention and where rectification needs to be carried out. It will also ensure consistency in ICT activities. The Policy articulates the minimum requirements expected to which, Government organizations can add to and create their own organizational ICT policies, within this Policy framework. Thus, the Policy will be a first step towards implementing a standards-based approach in implementing e-Government services.

The National ICT Policy formally recognizes ICT as a major thrust area for national development. In this regard, the Policy will highlight strategies and action plans for an enabling infrastructure, legal frameworks, information security and standards, human resources capacity building, socio economic development (including poverty alleviation, health care and use of ICT in local languages), and utilizing ICT for trade facilitation and e-commerce, e-government, industry and global competitiveness, and environmental issues. The policy will be drafted with stakeholder participation to ensure the document is representative and holistic in nature.

Target Group

ICT Policy for Government
All Government organizations: Ministries, Government Departments, Provincial Councils, District Secretariats, and Divisional Secretariats and Local Authorities. Adoption of the Policy by Government Corporations, Statutory Bodies, and Fully Government owned Companies is recommended.

National ICT Policy
All organizations and individuals, including citizens engaged in ICT driven activities.

Project Results

• A formal ICT Policy for Government setting standards for implementation and management of ICT within government entities.
• A National ICT Policy describing the manner in which ICT will contribute to development.

Project Benefits

• Structured adoption and uniformity of ICT in all its aspects to make Government more efficient and effective, and improve access to Government services, to create a more citizen centric Government.
• A framework to support and guide all ICT related activities in the country

The objective of M&E will be to strongly support ICTA results-oriented programmes and projects, by focusing on measuring progress towards, and the achievement of, development results.

Description

To enable measurement and development effectiveness and impact of the e-Sri Lanka project, for which ICTA is the implementing agency, M&E is identified as a critical function, cutting across all programme areas.

M&E will aid decision-makers, programmes, and project managers to assess performance at all levels, evaluate contributions, and measure overall impact. One of the primary components of the M&E system will be a Performance Management Information System (PMIS) or decision support system for ICTA. The PMIS will assist project managers to correlate projects and results to see if overall objectives are being met, incorporate lessons learned into modifying subsequent project phase implementation and in formulating new projects.

One of the challenges with M&E faced by development agencies in the past, is that evaluation in particular, is post event and thereby unable to effectively inform, intervene and improve a live project. With this in mind, ICTA results based M&E framework, will consist of both traditional output and outcome indicators, but also intermediate targets and indicators, which will serve as a powerful tool for decision makers, enabling ICTA to dynamically monitor its progress.

Target Group

ICTA, stakeholders, and implementation partners

Project Results

• A Results-Based Framework covering all programmes, projects and activities, with relevant performance indicators.
• A Performance Management Information System (PMIS).
• Efficient mechanisms and procedures to link project management and implementation teams to enable sharing of information and opportunities for learning.

Project Benefits

• Ensure development objectives as mandated by programmes are being met.
• Adequate mechanisms in place to provide outcome analysis, lessons learned and efficient decision making feedback.

Build a knowledge management capability within ICTA and facilitate the sharing and dissemination of the organisation institutional knowledge, and enable knowledge and learning from "e-Sri Lanka" to be shared externally.

Description

The Knowledge Management (KM) project encompasses the approach, methodologies and specific initiatives to promote and facilitate the sharing of knowledge capital of the organization both internally and externally. A key component of the project will be to develop ICTA into a learning organization, where knowledge is not simply documented and stored, but the organization itself recognizes that learning and sharing of knowledge is of crucial importance to the Agency success.

The key dimensions of the overall KM system will address the content (how will it be captured and stored), with whom knowledge is shared (stakeholders and beneficiaries) and processes enabling knowledge sharing (how knowledge will be shared).

The KM programme will enable retention of intellectual capital, and transfer to new employees, maximise organization agility by recognizing the capabilities and ideas of employees, increase opportunities for collaborative work with partners and stakeholders and improve Return on Investment (ROI) on knowledge asset management by re-using information instead of re-inventing the wheel.

Target Group

ICTA Staff, Decision Makers, Government Institutions, the World Bank, other partners including Academia, Donors, NGOs, Media and the General Public.

Project Results

A comprehensive knowledge management system allowing for efficient capturing, storing and sharing of knowledge. System components will include:

• Centralised website with an enhanced intranet and secure extranet for partners and stakeholders, including an e-library
• Directory of skills, partners and assets
• Enterprise content management software solution
• Standard methodologies in project management, knowledge sharing
• Communities of Practice

Project Benefits

• A more effective ICTA, learning and more responsive to changing needs.
• Sharing of knowledge with external partners to promote and expedite ICT for development in Sri Lanka.
• Serve the greater ICT for Development community working together to implement the e-Sri Lanka initiative.

Develop an e-leadership capability in government, which is critical to implement reform and drive the process of re-engineering government and introducing e-government systems.

Project Description

ICTA will develop e-leadership within government by conducting awareness-raising and training for Chief Innovation Officers (CIOs) appointed across all government ministries, departments, statutory bodies, district secretariats, divisional secretariats and provincial councils. The CIOs play a key role in driving the e-transformation process within government and will be equipped with specialist skills to ensure they are ready to champion change within their respective line ministries and departments.

The role of the CIO in government could be described in more detail as follows:

• Lead and direct organizational strategic planning, and establishing an ICT strategy to guide research, development and maintenance to provide for continuous improvement of performance.
• Ensure organizational alignment with government ICT policy, as directed by the Administrative Reforms Committee (ARC), the ICT Task Force and ICTA.
• Maintain ICT utilization and sharing of information systems, applications, etc, and lead organization-wide efforts on information systems security, ensuring and maintaining standards.
• Ensure inter-ministry (or inter-department) coordination on ICT and serve as the organizational spokesperson on ICT issues

Based on the identified role of the CIO, the key skills needed by CIOs are: 1) ICT, 2) Knowledge of e-Government, e-Commerce and e-Laws concepts, 3) Strategic ICT Planning, Change Management and 5) Business Process Re-engineering. The project aims to carry out a series of logical and coordinated workshops to equip up to 300 CIOs with these skills and competencies.

Target Group

Chief Innovation Officers (CIOs) in Government.

Project Results

CIOs attend workshops and successfully complete training in

1. e-Government Concepts,
2. Change Management,
3. Business Process Re-engineering (BPR) and
4. Strategic ICT Planning.

Project Benefits

• Trained CIOs actively driving change management and process re-engineering within their respective ministries and departments.
• CIOs that participate in, and contribute to, the implementation of e-government strategies, working in coordination with ICTA and its appointed project management and implementation teams.

Create the enabling legal environment for the development Information and Communication Technology (ICT) including the enactment of required Laws by Parliament to facilitate e-government, e-business as well as to attract ICT related foreign direct investment.

Description

This program component will develop and implement the ICT legal and regulatory framework through the following projects:

Electronic Transactions Legislation

This project component would ensure the preparation of an Act of Parliament for the facilitation and recognition of electronic contracts, the creation and exchange of electronic communication, the establishment of a Certification Authority and the accreditation of Certification Service Providers and to facilitate the recognition of electronic filing by Government departments.

This project also envisages institutional and capacity building in Government for the accreditation of Service Providers under the proposed Act of Parliament and the development of legal standards with UNCITRAL Secretariat as well as assisting in the formulation of appropriate regulations.

ICT Crimes

The ICTA functioned as the Convenor in the Review of the Computer Crimes Bill presented to Parliament in August 2005. The Project component would Examine criminal implications of spamming and e-surveillance, and facilitate the establishment of a specialized Digital Forensic Lab in Police Department for the enforcement of Computer Crimes and also create the framework for the analysis of forensic evidence. Further, capacity building for enforcement officials would be undertaken under this project as well as developing linkages with foreign enforcement agencies.

Data Protection

Develop and implement legislative or other measures to ensure that Sri Lanka meets the adequacy levels required by the EU Directive on Data Protection, and promote institutional development for data protection and privacy issues. This would help to ensure that Sri Lanka complies with required legal standards for the development of the IT Enabled Services sector and the BPO sector.

Intellectual Property Rights

This Project component would develop the appropriate curricular and course materiel for the ICT Legal Module under the Intellectual Property Advance Diploma program conducted by the Sri Lanka Law College. This would also include the provision of learning tools.

Target Group

Ministries, Government Departments, Legal & Judicial, Commercial, Banking, Shipping and corporate sector.

Results

1. Formulate proposals for e-Transactions Legislation and finalise legislation through Legal Draftsman Department
2. Establish Unit for the Accreditation of service providers at the Accreditation Board
3. Develop appropriate regulations under the e-Transactions Legislation in conjunction with UNCITRAL.
4. Establish Computer Crimes Unit in the Police Department
5. Establish Computer Crimes Forensic Unit
6. Prepare Code of Practice on Data Protection

Benefits

• The establishment of an appropriate Legal framework for ICT development would help facilitate the growth of ICT in Sri Lanka, including e-business and e-government related activities, and create the environment for ICT related foreign direct investment.

The objective is to ensure that the benefits of ICT should be taken to the majority of the population in Sri Lanka which comprises people who prefer to use ICT in Sinhala or Tamil.

Description:

The ICT Agency of Sri Lanka (ICTA) has been addressing issues relating to enabling ICT in local languages such as the relevant standards with regard to encoding, keyboard layouts, sorting, and availability of standards based (Unicode compliant) fonts, availability of keyboards etc.

Primarily four main areas needed to be initially addressed in order to enable standards-based computing in local languages:

• A standard encoding.
• Development of standards-based fonts.
• A standard keyboard layout.
• Availability of standards-based applications.

Projects:

Thereafter ICTA worked on the following projects to enable ICT in Sinhala and Tamil:

• Sri Lanka Standard Sinhala Character Code for Information Interchange, SLS 1134 : 2004:

ICTA partnered with other organizations, specifically the Sri Lanka Standards Institution (SLSI) in standardizing the Sinhala character encoding and the Sinhala keyboard layout, following on the work carried out on this area by ICTA predecessor CINTEC. The standard comprises:

1. Encoding for Sinhala: compliant with the Unicode standard and with the Universal Character Set, ISO/IEC 10646.
2. A standard keyboard layout for Sinhala: based on the original Wijesekera keyboard layout. The standard also includes the keying in sequences and the code sequences.
3. Sinhala sorting sequence: The sorting order for Sinhala was one of the most important issues that had to be resolved. There were a number of issues regarding the sorting sequence of Sinhala that needed to be clarified. The sorting sequence was needed in order to set up data bases and other lists of information in Sinhala. Consequently through the University of Colombo School of Computing (UCSC) a suitable sorting sequence was recommended and later approved as a Sri Lanka Standard. This Sinhala collation sequence has now been standardized as SLS 1134 : 2004, Part 1. It consists of a dictionary collation sequence (to be used when correct collation, based on the linguistic derivation of Sinhala is required) and a simple collation sequence.

• Standards based fonts: ICTA spearheaded the development of Sinhala fonts compliant with SLS 1134. A Sinhala kit was thereafter created which included standard Sinhala fonts, keyboard driver and installation instructions, which was made available free of charge on www.locallanguages.lk. At present ICTA is working on developing a set of standards-based Sinhala font families, and intends to make the font rules available to font designers. ICTA is also about to commence a project on developing standards-based Tamil fonts.
• Testing products for compliance with SLS 1134 : 2004: a standard Test Method for Sinhala ICT products is now available through which organizations which have created Sinhala , comprising keyboard drivers, Unicode compatible fonts, and keyboards can get these certified as being compliant with the standard SLS 1134 : 2004. This will in turn indicate Unicode compliance. This standard has been approved by the Sri Lanka Standards Institution as Part 2 of the standard SLS 1134; 2004 Requirements and Methods of Test. The scope is for computers only.

ICTA is about to commence work on a similar standard Test Method for testing Tamil ICT products.

• Tamil keyboard layout: ICTA was tasked with recommending a keyboard layout for Tamil, as soon as possible. A team was set up, comprising Tamil linguistics, users, and those proficient in the Tamil language

A first workshop was held in October 2006 for stakeholders and the consensus was that they wish to use the Renganathan keyboard layout. Thereafter extensive research was conducted, meetings were held with other key stakeholders and it transpired that the Renganathan layout has at least 10 variations. A layout was developed based on Renganathan, after further analysis, and stakeholder consultation.

The proposed layout was presented to a wider audience in January 2007, with a demo keyboard driver for testing. The participants accepted the proposed layout with a few amendments. This keyboard layout is included in the Sri Lanka Tamil Character Code for Information Interchange, SLS 1326 : 2008.

• Sri Lanka Standard Tamil Character Code for Information Interchange and Tamil collation sequence, SLS 1326 : 2008, and Part 1 thereof.A document comprising encoding for Tamil characters aligned to the Unicode standard version 5.1, a keyboard layout and a standard sorting sequence for Tamil, was standardized in September 2008, by the Sri Lanka Standards Institution as the Sri Lanka Tamil Character Code for Information Interchange, SLS 1326 : 2008. The standard was launched on 24th November 2008.
  

• Using the standards on Windows and on Linux:

Keyboard drivers are available for using the standard Sinhala and Tamil keyboard layouts on Windows Vista and XP and on Linux distributions (available on www.locallanguages.lk)

• Local language keyboard: ICTA promoted the development of (physical) keyboards based on the standard Sinhala and Tamil keyboard layouts which are now available in the market.
  

• Locale information for Sinhala and Tamil: To support users of different languages, software should be adapted to the conventions specific to that language, script, region and country etc. The Unicode CLDR provides key building blocks for software to support the world's languages. CLDR is by far the largest and most extensive standard repository of locale data. This data is used by a wide spectrum of companies for their software internationalization and localization. www.unicode.org

ICTA is addressing two projects on locale information one for Sinhala and the other for Tamil - to collect and document the overall national preferences and use with regard to Sinhala locale information and Tamil locale information respectively.

• Internationalized Domain Names (IDNs): Country Code Top Level Domain Name (ccTLD) in Sinhala and in Tamil scripts - A Task Force was set up to work on Sinhala and Tamil Internationalized Domain Names (IDNs). Agreement was reached on the IDN ccTLDs as follows: for Sinhala and for Tamil.
   
• Portal: A portal in all three languages has been developed through which information and software on local languages are disseminated, for those involved in Unicode related local languages projects. “ www.siyabas.lk, www.emathumozhihal.lk, www.locallanguages.lkLocal Languages Initiative (LLI)