Vision, Outcomes, Related Strategies, Goals, Challenges & Actions
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Creating a Digital New Zealand
A digital society is one that is well advanced in international terms in the adoption and integration of digital technologies into daily life, whether at work, home or play.
Successfully creating a digital future like this for New Zealand will mean having the necessary technologies and infrastructure present and accessible; having trained and educated content creators and users; and having sufficient knowledge creation and generation of content in digital form. The success of the Digital Content Strategy is dependent on the Connection and Confidence enablers of the Digital Strategy addressing the technology and skills dimensions, and on continued work in other areas of content.
The Digital Content Strategy is a key initiative of the Digital Strategy, providing a dimension through which to view wider digital issues over the next five years. The governance, oversight and evaluation of its delivery fall under that of the Digital Strategy.
The structure of this strategy is outlined in the diagram below (Figure 10). The various parts are described in turn.
Government Priorities
The Digital Content Strategy contributes directly to the government’s priorities of:
Economic Transformation – working to progress our economic transformation to a high income, knowledge based market economy, which is both innovative and creative and provides a unique quality of life to all New Zealanders; and
National Identity – all New Zealanders to be able to take
pride in who and what we are, through our arts, culture, film, sports and music, our appreciation of our natural environment, our understanding of our history and our stance on international issues.
Vision
In recognising the above priorities and the connected outcomes of Connection, Confidence and Content, the Digital Content Strategy adheres to the Digital Strategy vision:
“New Zealand will be a world leader in using information and technology to realise its economic, social, environmental, and cultural goals, to the benefit of all its people.”
Outcomes
The five elements of digital content help establish a set of content-related areas to address in achieving a digital New Zealand. Expressed as a set of outcomes, they create five main outcome areas for the Digital Content Strategy:
- Digital content is being created and protected;
- Digital content is accessible and easily discovered;
- Digital content is being shared and used;
- Digital content is being managed and preserved; and
- Digital content is understood.
In the following pages, each outcome area is described in terms of its overarching goal, the challenges ahead, the actions and the key initiatives for the next one to two years. Where current actions from separate yet related government strategies contribute to the challenges ahead, these have been identified.
The Digital Strategy and Related Strategies
A wide number of related government strategies, programmes and actions are contributing to creating our digital future under the Digital Strategy. Those that have a particular relevance to digital content include:
The Digital Strategy is about creating a digital future for all New Zealanders, using the power of information and communications technologies to enhance all aspects of our lives. The strategy recognises that the information we access through digital technologies can promote innovation, increase productivity, and enrich the quality of our lives. The strategy identifies content as one of three enablers, and under this enabler establishes the following goal:
To unlock New Zealand’s stock of content and provide all New Zealanders with seamless, easy access to the information that is important to their lives, businesses, and cultural identity.
The E-government Strategy 2006 is the all-of-government approach to transforming how agencies use technology to deliver services, provide information, and interact with people, as they work to achieve the outcomes sought by government. It sets out how government will carry out its obligations under the Digital Strategy, and how technology will be used in achieving the Development Goals for the State Services.
The strategy recognises technological innovation is transforming our world and focuses on government meeting the challenges this creates. New Zealanders expect government to interact with them using the new technologies they are familiar with in other parts of their lives – social networking websites and tools (Web 2.0), as well as the full range of digital channels and Internet pathways.
It also acknowledges that government must remain inclusive, making sure those who cannot or will not use these new technologies can still be engaged.
The E-government Strategy also looks ahead to the digital future of government. New ways of joining up information held by government and others to provide better services and user-friendly access to authoritative information on New Zealand issues, places, events and people, will have a significant impact. Government-held information is increasingly available in digital form. Better information will encourage public debate on issues and greater participation in the design of policies and how they are delivered. Information ownership and access will continue to be key issues.
The New Zealand Geospatial Strategy, launched in 2007, is designed to improve knowledge of, and access to, the geospatial assets owned, maintained or used by government. It recognises government’s increasing reliance on geospatial information for a wide range of activities - from emergency services and national defence to utilities, resource management, biosecurity, and economic development.
The purpose of the Strategy is to:
- define the approach needed to ensure New Zealand’s geospatial information infrastructure meets the ongoing business needs of government;
- provide the framework for the leadership and direction needed for managing geospatial information;
- optimise the collective benefit from public investment in geospatial infrastructure; and
- ensure quality fundamental (i.e. priority) geospatial data is available to all.
The ICT Strategic Framework for Education aims to improve learner achievement in an innovative education sector, fully connected and supported by the smart use of ICT.
The ICT Strategic Framework for Education seeks to deliver this vision through:
- a more learner-centred education system transcending organisational boundaries;
- more informed decision making within the education sector by learners, teachers, parents, communities, public, businesses, researchers, policy makers, and administrators;
- increased ease and opportunity of access and reduced compliance costs for all participants;
- increased confidence, capability and capacity from the use of ICT by all participants in the education sector; greater opportunities for the generation, application and sharing of new ideas and technologies; and
- more effective and efficient investment in ICT by education sector government agencies.
This work has already resulted in greater discoverability and access to electronic learning materials through a federated search system allowing a single search across materials in New Zealand, Australia and the USA, and will be extended to an even broader set of New Zealand and international resources. Role-based authentication and authorisation is also ensuring that information and content remains protected where necessary.
Public Broadcasting Programme of Action
The government’s Public Broadcasting Programme of Action outlines six priorities to guide public broadcasting policy development to 2010:
- achieving adequacy and certainty of public funding for broadcasting;
- strengthening public broadcasting;
- facilitating the successful development of digital broadcasting services;
- enhancing regional and community broadcasting;
- enhancing independence and responsibility in broadcasting; and
- enhancing the incentives for producing higher-quality content and schedules.
The Programme of Action is informed by issues associated with the convergence of broadcasting, the Internet, and digital technology.
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