Knowledge-Based Economy Project

The objective of the project is to facilitate participation of disadvantaged communities in terms of access to information at the knowledge society, in line with government's strategy of integration into the European Union. The Project, Knowledge-Based Economy has been initiated by the Romanian Government, through the Ministry of Communications and Information Society, with support from the World Bank.

Information Society is based on the availability of modern tools, which facilitates transfer of data between authorities, educational institutions, ministries or other public entities and their direct beneficiaries, who are citizens.

To facilitate public access to information of interest regarding culture, education, administration, law and business, the plan is to expand computerized services to the public. A highly functional way - in terms of complexity and coverage of issues of interest to the community - is to launch and manage portals.

Knowing the needs and benefits of implementing such a solution to the small and very small communities, the Ministry of Communications and Information Society, along with the Government and support from the World Bank who was involved in implementing the portal: eComunitate , based on custom software and being able to provide beneficiaries of communities the possibility of interaction with the authorities, but also with other communities, and environmental services online.

The practice of portals in mediation of services on certain categories of the public is quite new in Romania, but experience in this direction provides the best direction for such initiatives.

The eComunitate portal is a comprehensive collection of websites, which offer a wide range of information and services online. Using this portal, users benefit from access to structured information, have their own search engines and have advanced ability to interact through this solution, with the representatives of other communities.

In the process of development of the portal eComunitate were considered the benefits that this initiative can bring on communities that participate in the program, but also society as a whole. From this we can name: the improvement of inter-communities communication, easier access to the state institutions, learning the population from these areas to use the internet and the facilities of the online environment, the encouragement to trade information and the greater efficiently in promoting the local values of the communities.

As an essential objective, the project aims to involve local people in rural areas in social and cultural life of the society, via the Internet.

By extending tools of remote communication in territory, to the villages and small municipalities, eComunitate project aims to contribute to increased incidence of education and communication to members of small communities and very low in Romania.

This initiative falls within the strategies of social emancipation of disadvantaged categories of population.

The reasons for which eComunitate is situated in the great family of European projects of dissemination of knowledge is the mission of starting such an approach.

Using a model already established in other countries, through technology, seeks to virtually eliminate the gaps between city and village.

Freedom of information , using Internet access in small communities across the country brings them in contact with comprehensive information resources.

This way, members of disadvantaged communities can easily climb, the inconvenience of geographical distance to major cultural centers.

By a simple click, any community included in the project can access information, with maximum economy of time.

On the other hand, the community-portal connections benefits works in the opposite direction. Civil society and business in particular can find in the portal a very useful tool for business opportunities existing in the community, knowledge in specific cultural, social and business in rural settlements participating in the project.

"It is in the interest of citizens from communities to have access to information, to a multitude of resources and, last but not least, to provide those interested responses and clarifications on local realities, whether we talk about cultural area, the special administrative or offer local business. In addition, the portal offers users of eComunitate a quick and easy access to desired information, with the possibility of customization of this experience, according to the needs of users punctual. By simple direct and explicit interaction , facilitated by the portal, beneficiaries of the community have the opportunity to experience, individually, the advantages of communication online. They earn practically new skills in using the web. The advantage of time economy and efficiency of online communication is that users of this portal can actually search information in large repositories of data, and can generate, and populate content areas related to community portal, and last but not least, can be present and active in building sites, blogs and wiki sites, interactive ways to share information.", says Diana Voicu, Director Ministry of Communications and Information Society.