Information society

The development of the information society is one of the national priorities of the Republic of Belarus and is considered to be a national task that requires joint efforts of government, business and civil society.

Meanwhile, information and communication technologies (ICT) play a role of the tool necessary for the development of highly technological sector of the economy, improvement of institutional and creation of a favorable business environment.
Over the last decade, as a result of government programs implementation, including the projects of the State program of informatization of the Republic of Belarus for 2003-2005 and until 2010 “Electronic Belarus”, and the National Program of Accelerated Service Development in the field of ICT for 2011 - 2015, developed for the implementation of the Strategy for Information Society Development in the Republic of Belarus for the period up to 2015, a number of multi-functional national and departmental information systems have been developed.

In the report of the United 2016 the value of e-Government Readiness Index of the Republic of Belarus corresponds to 49th place out of 193 countries. In a similar report of the UN in 2012 Belarus was ranked 61st.

The following infrastructural projects on the informatization of all spheres of life were created:

State Management System of Public Keys (GosSUOK) is created and functions (http://pki.gov.by/gossuok/);
Interdepartmental electronic document management system which is the main method of information exchange between government agencies and organizations is created;
National Automated Information System (NAIS) intended for integration of state information resources and automation of work of government agencies providing electronic services is developed and implemented (https://portal.gov.by/);
National Center for Electronic Services which is the operator of interdepartmental information systems providing paid and free of charge electronic services to government agencies, organizations and individuals is created (http://nces.by/).
The number of large-scale industrial projects are completed, through which the services in the following fields are rendered.

Economy and Trade
All competitive kinds of public procurement procedures are conducted by customers (organizers) only by means of electronic trading platform (http://www.icetrade.by/).
Tax and customs administration
Development of information systems and SIR “State Register for payers of the Republic of Belarus (other liable persons)”, “Data on incomes of individuals” and provision of state electronic services using NAIS are carried out.

The National automated system of customs declaration procedures is created, allowing the participants of international trade to provide customs authorities with information in the form of electronic customs documents and electronic preliminary information; a system project on modernization of information and communication infrastructure of customs authorities is developed and implemented to increase the efficiency and quality of information services rendered to interested persons; integration with state information resources of ministries and departments is ensured.

Utilization of land
Development of information systems and SIR “Register of addresses of the State Land Cadastre”, “Unified Register of administrative-territorial and territorial units of the Republic of Belarus”, “Register of land prices of the State Land Cadastre” is completed; the information system and SIR “Unified Register of bankruptcy data”, ensuring the provision of the state electronic services using NAIS, is developed and implemented.
State cartographic Internet-service with the opportunity to be installed at any web-site for free or charged usage is developed.

Education
Republican system of information support of teachers’ certification, university electronic admission system and remote professional skills improvement system for management and specialists in the field of prevention and liquidation of emergency situations are developed.

Public Health Service
The technology of full account of injuries in the Republic of Belarus and Republican information and analytical system for medical examination and rehabilitation of the disabled are created. The work on the development of republican telemedicine medical consultation system continues.

Labour and Social protection
The automated information system of the Fund of social protection of the population for on-line provision of payers with personified record keeping documents is developed; information portal of the State Employment Service and info line on social protection issues are created.

National content

Public media portal (http://belsmi.by/news/) is created.

Implementation of the next medium-term society informatization stage is carried out in accordance with the Strategy on the development of informatization in the Republic of Belarus for 2016 – 2022, approved by the Presidium of the Council of Ministers of the Republic of Belarus on November 3, 2015. In this regard, on March 23, 2016 the Decision of the Council of Ministers of the Republic of Belarus No. 235 approved the State Program on Development of Digital Economy and Information Society in Belarus for 2016-2020.

The program consists of three sub-programs.
Sub-program "Information and communication infrastructure" includes measures for creation and development of modern national information and communication infrastructure, as well as the services provided on its basis taking into account ICT development (multiservice telecommunication networks, fiber-optic communication lines, LTE (4G), IP-television, television broadcasting with the use of Internet technologies, cloud technologies).
Sub-program "Informatization infrastructure" aimed at further implementation of e-government technologies aimed at the implementation of state functions by means of ICT in order to improve the efficiency and transparency of the state regulation system. Includes projects on creation of Belarusian integrated service and settlement system, development of State ECS open keys control system, the national segment of Eurasian Economic Union integrated information system, etc.).
Sub-program "Digital Economy" contains projects that will provide efficiency gains as for the implemented functions and labour productivity based on the transformation of business processes through ICT in all spheres of modern society, including in the real sector of economy and social sphere. Among the projects are: e-school, e-prescription, e-register of administrative procedures, etc.
International assessment

According to the report of the International Telecommunication Union for 2016, the Republic of Belarus is ranked 31st out of 157 in terms of value of the ICT Development Index, having risen from the 36th position. Our country has been marked as one of ten world economies with the highest dynamic in terms of the ICT access and use.