2. The National ICT Vision and Objectives
For many years, there has been a global recognition that ICT can enable a country’s economic
prosperity through its capacity to improve the management and efficiency of all spheres of the
lives of individuals and businesses. This is particularly true for small island states and emerging
economies as ICT can significantly reduce the impact of time and location, and enable a small
island country to have a global reach.
In this context, the vision of the Government of St. Lucia for ICT has been captured in the
following statement:
“Improve the quality of life in Saint Lucia by embracing ICT to promote development,
innovation and global competitiveness thereby enabling sustainable social and economic
growth.”
In achieving this vision, Government strongly believes that the following core values must be
maintained, supported and enabled, namely:
•
Community
•
Integrity
•
Innovation
The delivery of the national ICT agenda must therefore support the building and strengthening
of the communities that exist throughout the country; it must facilitate the integrity of all that
government does; and finally, it must release and enable the innovation that is inherent in the
people of St. Lucia.
At a broad conceptual level, Government defined the outcomes that it expects the national ICT
strategy to achieve. It requires that the overall governance of the public service become more
effective and that service delivery to citizens and businesses be extensively facilitated using
electronic delivery channels. It expects that ICT would enable significant economic growth
through the creation of new ICT‐related job opportunities that citizens would reach out to fill. It
is believed that with the innovative use of ICT within the health care delivery system that the
health and well‐being of the citizens of St. Lucia would improve. This in itself would have
significant spill‐over benefits to the country as healthy citizens cost less to the state and can
contribute more to their families, the community, and the economy. It is also expected that ICT
would improve national security and the administration of justice in the country through
careful collection, sharing and mining of information. Finally, it was required that investments
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