Finland, Sweden and the Netherlands are the best performing EU Member States in the digital field, according to a European Commission study published on 11 June. In contrast, the lowest ranked countries are Italy, Poland, Greece, Romania and Bulgaria.
This study, published annually under the title ‘Annual Digital Economy and Society Index’ (DESI), assesses Member States' performance in connectivity, human capital, Internet use, digital technology integration and digital public services. It was published at the same time as a study on the place of women in a digital society (‘Women in Digital’).
According to a European source, the most disappointing results relate to user competence: 43% of Europeans do not have basic digital skills, an improvement of only one percentage point compared to 2017. With this study, it was also learned that one tenth of Europeans (11%) have never surfed online.
On the positive side, the Commission notes significant progress over the last 5 years in Ireland (digitisation of companies), Lithuania (digital public services), Latvia (digital public services), Cyprus (broadband connectivity) and Spain (very high speed deployment). In addition, the development of 5G is progressing well in 12 Member States (especially Finland and Italy), as these countries have already allocated part of the spectrum.
However, the institution regrets that some countries with booming economies are performing poorly on specific issues, as is the case in Germany on eGovernment. And it concludes: “The fact that the EU's largest economies are not digital pioneers indicates that the process of digital transformation must be accelerated if the EU is to remain globally competitive”. According to a biennial international analysis (i-DESI), the latest version of which dates back to 2018, the EU performs less well than Japan, Korea and the United States and better than China, Mexico and Brazil.
DESI 2019: https://bit.ly/1UPeUWV (Original version in French by Sophie Petitjean)