TECHNOLOGY-CHILE: Gov’t Promotes Insertion in New Economy

By IPS Correspondents Reprint | | Print |

Gustavo González

SANTIAGO, Apr 1 2002 (IPS) - The Chilean government has designated more resources aimed at making the Internet available to more people, and President Ricardo Lagos enacted a law creating the “digital signature”, part of a package of initiatives to put this South American country “in the vanguard” of the so-called new economy.

The deputy minister of Economy, Alvaro Díaz, said half of Chile’s Telecommunications Development Budget for this year will go towards investment in Internet connectivity and strengthening the National Network of Infocentres.

The Telecoms Development Fund is a programme to extend rural telephone lines, and the Infocentres are public sites for low- income sectors throughout the country providing free access to the Internet.

Díaz’s announcements followed the enactment of the law on “digital signatures and electronic documents” last week.

Economy Minister Jorge Rodríguez stated that the new law “aims to legally regulate commercial operations carried out via the Internet, thus providing greater confidence for foreign capital to invest in Chile.”

Lagos said the electronic signature “is an important step that allows us to take six more fundamental steps to put Chile among the vanguard of the new economy.”

The first of the six steps will be the second phase of the Chilean state purchasing system via the Internet, for an October launch in which 11,000 companies will be registered as suppliers or purchasers of government institutions.

Between 2003 and 2004 the electronic billing system will become a reality, developed by the Internal Tax Service, with input from the private sector, said the president.

The third step is the government’s “electronic agenda” has slated for 2003 the creation of a “one-stop window” in the virtual world for private companies to handle transactions with the state.

Fourth, the government will send to Congress legislative bills on cyber-crime, e-contracts, consumer protection and intellectual property rights, with the objective that they become law by the end of this year.

Then, a new reform of the capital market, in addition to what was done in 2000, aimed at creating more modern and flexible financing systems for emerging enterprises, will be channelled in the same way through telecoms, said Lagos.

The sixth step will be to encourage more payments to take place via the Internet in the Chilean banking system.

The law on digital signatures is a bid to build user confidence in electronic platforms, through legally recognised security systems, about the identity of those who emit messages and the integrity of the data they contain.

The contracts signed using this mechanism are now legally valid and have the same effect as those that are written, says the new law. The advantage is that the new method reduces the costs of the transaction, creating greater efficiency and productivity.

The new measures for Chile’s information sphere are part of the “pro-growth agenda” the government announced Mar 15, drafted in conjunction with business organisations.

One of the agenda’s recommendations is to create on-line systems to facilitate some 80 different transactions (legal, finance, tax, labour, commerce) that companies must perform on a regular basis.

Lagos noted that the annual sum of purchases by the state is 1.5 billion dollars, divided between one billion in acquisitions by the central government and 500 million dollars by the municipal governments.

Chile’s insertion in the new economy was one of the central chapters of the governmental strategy Lagos proposed in May 2000 in his first address before Congress.

In November of that year, in a tour of the United States, the president met with Bill Gates, head of the computer giant Microsoft, with whom he signed a series of assistance agreements.

The consensus achieved by Lagos, a moderate socialist, with the business community in defining the pro-growth agenda should contribute to greater legislative support for laws related to the digital economy and Internet development in Chile.

“With the appropriate public policies and the willingness of the private sector to invest in information technology, we will inevitable advance in Internet connectivity,” said deputy minister Díaz.

According to the official, Chile is the leader in Latin America as far as Internet development and the incorporation of information technologies.

A report from the U.S.-based International Data Corporation, from September 2001, stated that five percent of the Latin American population had Internet access, compared to rates of more than 50 percent in the United States, Sweden and Singapore.

The same report stated that Chile had nine percent Internet penetration, ahead of Brazil with 5.7 percent, Argentina with 2.8 percent and Mexico with 2.5 percent.