Working on the Digital Agenda for Europe
Tuesday, 22 June 2010
A month ago, the European Commission released its new Digital Agenda for Europe. The Commission has set up a web page where you can register your intentions to carry out any actions in support of the goals set out in the Agenda. We've registered our intention to set up an online campaign promoting actions to support digital inclusion. This will be aimed at policy makers, digital society thought leaders and the general public and will be delivered through a range of online and social media. We're currently working on getting funding.
The Digital Agenda outlines the direction of the European Information Society for the next 5 years and is the first of the flagship initiatives under the Europe 2020 strategy for smart, sustainable and inclusive growth. It puts interoperability and inclusion at the centre of the Digital Single Market and commits to legislative proposals to ensure public sector websites are fully accessible by 2015. These are positive developments, albeit limited and ones that may take a while to filter through to actions and results in member states.
The Digital Agenda for Europe takes over from the i2010 Strategy which included e-inclusion as one of its three pillars but failed to deliver results on the ground (the targets agreed by EU Ministers in the Riga Declaration (PDF,180KB) were resoundingly unmet).