UGANDA | GOVTECH | IMPROVED

Uganda has shown improvement in the 2022 GovTech Maturity Index (GTMI), which covers 198 countries, the World Bank has reported.

The index reflects what countries have done in the area of GovTech, such as supporting key GovTech systems, improving public services, encouraging more active citizen participation, and facilitating the development of overall digitalization.

In the GTMI 2022 update, Uganda has been promoted to Group A, which includes the leading countries in this sphere. Previously, Uganda was in Group B, which combines a group of countries focused on the development of GovTech.

The index reflects the situation with digital transformation in 198 countries, which are divided into four groups: A, B, C, and D. In 2022, Uganda will have managed to take a step up from Group B to Group A.

According to the World Bank GovTech Maturity Index Report 2022, the result is based on new data about the progress the country has shown in the four priority areas.

The World Bank updated its GovTech maturity index (GMTI) on November 16, 2022, in which the NITA-U team filled out the questionnaire for Uganda.

The index reflects the situation with digital transformation in 198 countries in terms of what has been done in the four GovTech focus areas: supporting core government systems, enhancing service delivery, mainstreaming citizen engagement, and fostering GovTech enablers and practitioners in the design of new digital transformation projects.

In the GovTech maturity index 2022 update, Uganda’s index value has risen from 0.639 out of 1 in 2020 to 0.858 in 2022. Uganda has also been promoted to group A, which includes the leading countries in this sphere (score of 0.75- 1.00) and previously, Uganda was in group B (score of 0.50-0.74), which combines a group of countries focused on the development of the GovTech.

Uganda will rank second to Tanzania in the Govtech Maturity Index in 2022 among EA countries and leaders in the digital citizen engagement index and core government systems index.

The report further noted that despite progress in online service delivery and underlying shared platforms, the digital divide in the world is on the rise. 

According to Hatwib Mugasa, the executive director of NITA-U, this aligns with Uganda’s National IT 2022 survey findings, which show that although significant progress has been achieved in terms of overall penetration of and utilization of IT services, unequal access to and use of such services across the country remains a major challenge, with especially rural-urban, gender, and income-based divides.

He said adequate resources should be allocated by the governments for investments in shared digital public infrastructure (with a focus on interoperability, digital ID, and payments, among other things), and the performance and use of existing and new platforms should be monitored and reported regularly.

The GovTech Maturity Index (GTMI) was developed as part of the GovTech Initiative to introduce a measure of GovTech maturity in four focus areas — supporting core government systems, enhancing service delivery, mainstreaming citizen engagement, and fostering GovTech enablers— and to assist practitioners in the design of new digital transformation projects. Constructed for 198 economies, the GTMI is the most comprehensive measure of digital transformation in the public sector.