Measuring customers’ satisfaction with E-government services in Egypt
"A case study of E-Education Services"

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Contents
I.Introduction and research problem
II.The E-government and customer satisfaction (Theoretical Framework) a- E-government services b- Customer satisfaction c-The relationship between the two concepts Page number
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4-7

III.Measuring customers’ satisfaction with E-government services in Egypt
(A case study on E-education services)

a- The Egyptian experience in applying the E-government services. b- The satisfaction of the customers
(students) with in E-education services. c- Evaluating of the E- services and addressing the challenges and the opportunities. IV.Conclusion
V.References
Annex 1- Egypt's short country fact sheets 7-12

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14-16
17-21

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I. Introduction
E-government is one of the obvious manifestations of the adoption of information and communication technologies in the public work place. It implies the delivery of government services to customers, business partners, government employees, and other government agencies (Deloitte Research, 2000). Elmargamid and McIver (2001) classified E-government services into four levels; one-way information provision, bi-directional information on demand, complex transactional services to the creation of e-customer portals. Examples of these services are vast including; birth and death certificates, property taxes, vehicle taxes, income returns taxes, shop licenses and renewal, car driving licenses, traffic fine bills, personal documents, and education.
The discussion of E-service quality in the public sector is even more limited.
The existing body of literature on E-service quality lacks integrating the measurement of customer satisfaction with the electronic service delivery processes especially in developing countries like Egypt. It intends to focus instead on ideal standards rather than examining the realities of actual service delivery and customers' satisfaction.
However, the efforts made toward encouraging more civic engagement combined with more responsive government should be measured from customer’s point of view in an effort to promote for effective governance results. The customer should be regarded as an active actor in the process of E-public service delivery despite the original view as a passive recipient of the service. Also, public managers have little feedback regarding how well their projects are being Perceived by the general public and whether or not they have made a difference to the customers' welfare. This represents a gap in research in this area which the current paper is supposed to cover.
Specifically, the paper attempts to assess E-public service quality and discuss the implications for public managers.
This paper aims mainly to address the relationship between customer satisfaction and E- government services in general, and then it spotlights the Egyptian application of the E-government services and the customer satisfaction especially with the E-education services. The paper will be mainly divided into two sections. The first section will include the main concepts of the paper which are the E-government services and customer satisfaction and the relationship between the two concepts. The second section will deal with the Egyptian experience of E-government in relationship with the customer satisfaction, and it focuses on the relationship in the E-education services. II. The E-government and customer satisfaction (Theoretical Framework)

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According to the main research problem, the main concepts of the paper are;
E-government and customers' satisfaction. In understanding the relationship between the two concepts, it is very critical to examine their conceptual definitions and address the various aspects of the relationship of the two concepts. The following section is an introduction to develop the case study. a- E-government services (the concept, features and measures)
Concerning the definition of “E-government”, it lacks a consistent definition among the scholars and in the literature review. Some scholars defined E-government in a simple way as it is “Utilizing the Internet (www) in delivering government information and services to customers”. Another definition of E-government which is widely accepted is the use of primarily Internet-based information technology to enhance the accountability and performance of government activities. These activities include government’s activities execution especially services delivery, access to government information and processes, and customers and organizations participation in government (Parmita Saha, 2008, P.5). Furthermore, E-government can be defined as “the application of information technology to make available Internet services between public sector agencies and customers, private sector organizations, employees, and other nongovernmental agencies”(Craig Paul Orgeron, 2008, p 5).
Some scholars go further and address some aspects and components of Egovernment that constitutes customer access to government information, facilitating compliance with rules, customer access to personal benefits, procurement including purchasing, and payment. One of the most common E-government initiatives is to provide customers with access to government information which is beneficial for both customers and government by reducing distribution costs for government, and ensuring access to information and timely updated materials for customer. (Parmita
Saha, 2008, P.6)
Earlier research work on E-government evaluation has proposed several perspectives to the process. One of them was evaluating E-government websites in terms of compliance with laws related to security, privacy, and freedom of information (Eschenfelder et al., 1997; Smith, Fraser, & McClure, 2000). Huang and
Chao (2001) assert that evaluation should be based on usability principles, specifically that websites should employ a user-centered design which allows users to effectively locate the information they are seeking. Holliday (2002) developed a set of evaluation criteria for E-government usefulness, including the amount of information about the government, contact information, feedback options, search capabilities, and related links. Alternatively, The Value Measuring Methodology advocates evaluation of Egovernment websites based on cost/ benefit, social, and political factors.
Gupta and Jana (2003) suggested evaluating E-government sites in terms of the tangible and intangible economic benefits the sites produce, while Dragulenscu
(2002) suggested focusing on the quality of the services provided by the Egovernment. In the same time, Ritchie and Blanck (2003) indicated that Egovernment websites should be continuously evaluated in relation to the users of human services provided, such as everyday life information, referral services, peer counseling, and advocacy services(Jaeger and Bertot, 2010).
Thus, in all prior efforts to developing E-government service evaluation strategies to measure customer satisfaction, they rely on multi-method approaches that
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collect data using a number of methods from different stakeholders to provide the fullest picture of the service and dimensions of customer quality perceptions (Jaeger and Bertot, 2010). The nature of delivery system and the criteria used to assess the quality of E-services differ quietly between developed and developing countries.
Developing countries face serious difficulties in assessing the quality of their Egovernment applications due to lack of baseline data, absence of assessment guidelines, and the excessive reliance on subjective rating methods (Gupta, 2007). b- Customer satisfaction (the concept and features)
The satisfaction literature has not yet established a generally accepted definition of satisfaction. For some scholars, satisfaction is “the consumer’s fulfillment response” or “a judgment that a product or service feature provided a pleasurable level of consumption-related fulfillment, including levels of under or over fulfillment” (Craig Paul Orgeron, 2008). Another group of scholars have defined satisfaction as “an evaluation of an emotion”. Other scholars defined it as the consumer's response to the evaluation of the perceived discrepancy between prior expectations and the actual performance of the product as perceived after its consumption. (Alexander Settles, 2007). Parmita (2008) has defined satisfaction as
“the degree to which an individual is satisfied with his or her overall use of the system under evaluation” or “is an overall post purchase evaluation of the customer”. Some scholars defined the satisfaction as the way it measured with a particular Web site, they developed five components: content, format, accuracy, ease of use, and timeliness. Giese (2000) defined it as “A conscious evaluation or cognitive judgment the product has performed relatively well or poorly or that the product was suitable or unsuitable for its use/purpose”. Giese’s (2000) definition is the one adopted by the researchers working in this paper as it is a multi-dimensional definition.
Customers are using E-government websites to collect information for which the government is the monopoly provider. Customers’ satisfaction with E-government services is related to a customer’s perception of online service convenience, reliability of the information (transparency), and engagement with electronic communication media. However, public satisfaction with current E-government services is limited
(Jaeger and Bertot, 2010). The declining public satisfaction is caused by the faster development of private commercial websites offering more innovative and interactive services with users (Barr, 2007). Even for well educated or technology literate users, they face challenges due to unavailability of computers, internet access, search limitations, unfamiliarity with E-government services, language barriers, and overall technical anxiety for a significant portion of the general population (Jaeger &
Thompson, 2003).
This in turn points to the importance of exploring the many factors that might impede customers’ satisfaction with E-government services in developing countries characterized by special limitations and subject to serious challenges.
The following section addresses the relationship between E-government services and customer satisfaction based on the review of the literature. c- The relationship between E-government and customer satisfaction

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Many previous studies reported that the relationship between E-government services and customer satisfaction affects the likelihood that customers will trust and participate in government (Piasecki, 2010). E-government is defined from a customer perspective as "the delivery of government information and services online through the Internet or other digital means" (West, 2004). By this definition the author means
E-government ability to allow customers to seek public services at their own convenience and not just when the government office is open improving efficiency and effectives of public administration. Consequently, the vast E-government services have to satisfy customers' needs resulting into customer-centric E-service initiative.
Doll and Torkzadeh (1988) in their study have developed 12 items with five dimensions to measure end user satisfaction with E-government service quality in terms of Content, Accuracy, Format, Ease of Use and Timeliness. Giannakoudi
(1999) on the other hand suggested that security and privacy may add up to the overall satisfaction measurement framework. Agrawal, Shah, and Wadhwa (1985) developed two items to measure user satisfaction with E-government services which are the overall experience with online service and user’s feeling with online-service.
Recently, the focus shifted to emphasize on measuring customer satisfaction with E-government services within an overall framework of public performance measurement (Ray, 2010) despite the fact that The Office of Management and Budget
(OMB) has reported about the absence of customer satisfaction measures as a part of their E-government systems (U.S. Office of Management and Budget). The new measurement of E-government service quality will approach it from a customer perspective instead of previous efforts focusing on stages of growth, stakeholders' involvement or costs and benefits of the new initiative (Griffin and Halpin, 2005).
Wang, et al (2005) proposed a model of evaluating E-government system with a customer-centric approach. Eschenfelder and Miller (2005) proposed a sociotechnical toolkit for evaluation of E- government which addresses issues of openness and trust in E-government systems. Reddick (2004) analyzed the demand side of Egovernment, which has to do with aspects of customer interaction with E-government systems. Furthermore, the concept of E-service quality has been recently linked to the efforts made by the government to smooth the processes of public service delivery to its customers. Researchers developed several criteria to assess the quality of Eservices because online services show considerable variations from offline services. ,
Negash et al. (2003) identified information quality, systems quality, and service quality as dimensions of effective internet-based customer systems. Parasuraman et al. (2005) developed E-RecS-QUAL (consisting of responsiveness, compensation, and contact) as a measure of online service quality. Lee, Gim, and Yoo (2009) investigates relationship quality as another dimension to E-service quality, it comprises (needs fulfillment, interactive communications, and segmented services).
Several other dimensions to E-service quality have been explored but the exact list requires further consensus.

As (Horan, Abhichandani, and Rayalu, 2006) asserted, "Satisfaction measures are extensions of performance and quality measures"(p.2). Therefore, the current research paper argues that E-government service evaluation should be based on user
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satisfaction by being customer-centered because customers constitute the major significant user group that contributes to successfully achieve government transformative goals toward more civic engagement, transparency and democracy.

III. Measuring customers’ satisfaction with E-government services in Egypt
( A case study on E-education services)
It is important first to understand the Egyptian status with regard to Egovernment initiative. The serious challenges facing Egypt include inadequate internet technological infrastructure, lack of sufficient knowledge, skills and capital to build up a comprehensive national information databases, and the fact that the illiteracy rate in Egypt is more than 26 % of its population.
This following part is divided into three sections; the first one is about the
Egyptian experience in applying the E-government services. The second section is about the satisfaction of the customers (students) with in E-education services. The
Third section is about evaluating the E-education services and addressing the challenges and the opportunities. a- The Egyptian experience in applying the E-government services
Under the slogan of “the government now delivers”, the Egyptian government under the supervision of the Ministry of Communication and Information Technology
(MCIT) has launched the E-government program in July 2001. The official inauguration of the Egyptian E-government portal (www.egypt.gov.eg) has taken place in 2004. By the year 2008, the Egyptian E-government has become a provider of more than 80 electronic services and more than 700 applications. In one of the minister of administrative development presentations, he stressed that these improvements could not work without the Egyptian communication infrastructure. “
Egypt has more than 13.7 millions telephone line serving about 11.05 million participants with the service , more than 26.4 million participants in mobile phone services, and roughly 7.7 million participants in the internet services” the minister declared (E-government official documents,2008).
In 2010, the E-government program provides new service in achieving the vision of the program which is delivering efficient interactive services to the public through the telephone and the internet. These new services are (parliament elections candidates list for the year 2010, integrated income and sales tax services, 2009 income tax return, railway tickets reservation one day before travelling, electricity bills, payment for Canal Company, maps for governmental entities, and new services launch for first instance courts).
The main goal of these new services and even the old is to enhance the government’ ability to provide its services to the customer close to their residence and give the chance to everyone in the country to get his\her service delivered everywhere. (The official site of E-government, 2010).
In providing these new services, it is very important to know if the Egyptian customers are satisfied with the previous group of E-services, so the paper will focus on one service which is E-education as one of the most popular used E-services in
Egypt. These E-services can enhance the performance of government and public
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administration work; consequently it can push the efforts for achieving economic and social development. E-government projects can contribute in the same time to solving administrative problems in Egypt. , inefficient public administration, bribery, and poorly trained employees. Electronic services also help in facilitating government communication functions more efficiently and cheaply. (The official site of Egovernment, 2010).
The main available indicators of E-government data in Egypt are the following: 1) indicator on digital availability; 2) e-indicator for measuring the information community; 3) indicator of technological readiness of public institutions.
Data on readiness is available through regular international reports. Data on access is available through the Ministry of Information and Communication Technology. Data on outputs is made available to the public at large on the Egyptian government portal.
See annex 1.

b- The satisfaction of the customers (students) with in E-education services

There are many services and projects are involved in the E-education services; however, the university enrolment project, led by Ministry of State for Administrative
Development (MSAD) in coordination with the University Enrollment Co-ordination
Office, is the most popular. The admission to the public universities and institutions in
Egypt operated through a centralized office and 19 sub offices or what it is called
“Tansik offices” which are distributed all over the country .This office enrolls more than 500,000 students each year. The application process took place after students got their secondary school’ scores. This process tried to serve students in their regions as much as possible .This process is further complicated by the increasing number of eligible students to join universities each year. The general manager of the university enrolment project said “All eligible students were divided into three groups, according to their secondary school certificates’ results” (Hassan, Shehab, and Peppard, 2010, p1). Generally, students and their parents had to wait in long lines for hours in front of the university enrollment to purchase the application forms by roughly 40 pounds. Students had to fill the admissions application manually by listing their choices in a descending order of preference. The number of choices that each student had to fill is 48 choices. Then, the applications had to be submitted back to the university enrollment offices. Consequently, students and/or their parents needed to visit the enrollment office at least twice to apply for university enrollment. The general manager of the university office said that students were not able to access their personal information before the university enrollment results were out, and mistakes would be transferred to universities and students were usually not able to correct them before graduation. (Hassan, Shehab, and Peppard, 2010, p3)

The new initiative (E-Tansik Service) was gradually applied and firstly introduced in 2004 where it was used only by 3,500 students, then reached 21,000
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students in 2006. In those years it was allowed to use the paper system or the online and in using the online services, there was no single error. In 2007, the paper system was cancelled permanently and replaced with the new online service. By the Egovernment initiative of education, the whole system is changed and replaced the paper by web-based application and it is available 24/7 for student support. Hence, the enrolment application service is available once the internet is there (Ahmed Tobal,
2009, pp 6-9)
Students were able to access the application with their IDs and using special
PIN code that they received with their secondary school certificates. This online service will result in benefits for both the government and the public. , the general manager of the enrollment office said “The online application was offered entirely free of charge, against the EGP 40 students paid for the paper application and manuals”. In this case, supposed that over 500,000 students applied for university enrolment annually, this alone resulted in savings of over EGP 20,000,000 for the public. The online application also provides the students with interactive rules and guide lines. These online services prevent the student from choosing any wrong choice that contradicts with the rules and that wasn’t possible before according to the old paper system. (Hassan, Shehab, and Peppard, 2010, p 4)
The main objectives of this project are to decrease the costs for both the public and the government and offer the service through a more convenient channel from their place even home. Furthermore, It separates service provider from the public and that prevent corruption and long waiting lines a utilizes the use of available resources in order satisfy the customer demands to enjoy a convenient, simple, interactive and nonstop service .There were strategies created to deal with any problem ., a disaster recovery site was set up for the web-based application, should anything go wrong, as it would become a high-value target with more than 450,000 users. Internet connections of the application were highly secured from many different service providers. (Ahmed Tobal, 2009, pp 10-12)
The benefits of using the online application are that it permits the students to check their personal information before they submit their choices. It supports in decreasing errors in the future. It gives the students the chance to change their pervious choices after submitting them and that wasn’t allowed within the paper system. This system is working as a connector between the students, service providers and decision makers. Furthermore, it enhances the communication between the customer and the service providers, and it provides the service with a call centre hotline to help students if they face any problem in filling the online application. The students don’t have to wait for the result to be delivered to them by mail; they can access it from their profile on the internet in the same time it is declared. Furthermore, they received messages on their mobile phone numbers with the result as well .Some statistics have shown that Egypt in applying E-education services save more than
40,000,000 pounds without including the savings in paper forms and printed guidelines. (Hassan, Shehab, and Peppard, 2010, p 4)

The required infrastructures for that project were established to serve the number of the students for the system in 2007. , More than 600 computer labs were prepared all over Egypt to be ready to help the eligible students to use the online
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application for free. In addition, trained specialists were in each lab for nine hours daily to help students in filling the applications and training sessions were held annually for. In 2008, another version of the application was available to both local and international in all secondary school certificates. (Ahmed Tobal, 2009, pp 10-12)
The project systems reliability, convenience and efficiency achieve the students or the customer satisfaction and it gives the opportunity to the Egyptian to be more open to more E-government service than before and it enhance their trust in the
E-government service and push the use of the other E- services.
Many opinion polls were conducted by the poll center at the Information and
Decision Support Center (IDSC). These polls intended to measure the customer's satisfaction with E-government services and evaluation of its quality. These polls aimed to know how the customers evaluate these e-services and if they are ready to deal with new e-services in the future , in Poll 2010, more than 82% of those who used the service of E-tansik are satisfied with this service and they think it is good services. More than 95% of those who used the e-services believed that they are better than traditional services. More than 72% of those who used the e-services said that these services decrease the possibility of corruption in the public administration and have the services faster (Poll about the electronic government services, 2010).
P.S. Many of the questionnaires developed by the ministry to assess customers’ satisfaction with E-government service quality were uploaded to the
Egyptian portal and maintained in Arabic version. English versions were not found and due to time limitations research team was not able to make translation and attach them in the annexes section. Only the statistics highlighted in the previous section were translated from the most recent evaluation questionnaire.
Furthermore, The E-Tansik is not the only service provided by E-education programs, but there many E-services have been launched by the Ministry of
Education. , the ministry presents an updated database not only for the schools, but also for the students and the teachers as well. In addition, it announces the exams results for the students online, so each student can log in through his ID to get the grades. The ministry of education has launched a new program “Electronic
Management for Education” by this program the ministry offers through its website many services for the students as customer. , the students can print out the applications of admission, moving to other governorate, exemption of fees and other applications. All of these services concern is to reach each student in all the 29
Egyptian governorates and improve the provided services by the government. The ministry in the same time offers “electronic classes” for the students in some educational stages to help them understanding their courses and through these classes the students can take part in the discussions and asking any questions.
Owing to the continuous efforts of the ministry in improving its services and get the best use of the evaluation of the students to it services, new website called
“Question Bank” was established to train the students to deal with the exam through exam models and questions. These steps either related to a certain educational stage or

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all stages are very critical in achieving the citizen satisfaction with the E-education services. (Websites of the ministry of education)1

c- Evaluating E- services and addressing the challenges and the opportunities.
The detailed table below summarizes the major evaluation objectives for Egovernment identified in the country paper submitted by Egypt in the High Level
Seminar *2;
Objectives of evaluation at the national or sectoral level





To enhance Egypt’s ranking for the global economic competitiveness indicator -to measure and support
ICT use in the government administration. To enhance civil servants’ performance and IT capacity.
To measure the impact of the technological readiness indicators on Egypt’s economic and investment environment.

Objectives of evaluation at the ministry/agency or project level






To monitor progress and assess the capacity of each public institution to undertake reforms.
To create new opportunities for Egovernment projects.
To support government institutions in planning projects and directing investments by highlighting development and improvement of work cycles through better use of technology. To provide accurate information to decision makers for elaboration of accurate and efficient plans.

Egypt was one of the Arab countries that answered questions about the obstacles to E-government measurement and evaluation. The reported obstacles were; the lacks of evaluation culture either in the lower or higher levels, the absences of a common definition of costs and benefits. In addition, the lack of evaluation skills and tools, the non-availability of indicators; the difficulty in collecting the data. Moreover, there is non-clarity of who should perform the evaluation, and of the clients’ evaluation. Almost all countries use at least one type of evaluation tool/method for project evaluation at sectoral/ministry/agency or project level. However, the report indicated that most Arab countries have not developed sophisticated user-engaging tools which perform the evaluation from customer’s perspective.
By highlighting the main obstacles that faced the users of the E-education services, the government can update its services to satisfy the customer’ desires. The main obstacles that faced the program are mainly the resistance to change of the bureaucrats in the Ministry of Higher Education to use the new system and the
1

-http://www.emoe.org and Evaluating E-government in Arab Countries - High Level Seminar on Measuring and
Evaluating E-government and 3rd Meeting of Working Group 2 on E-government and Administrative
Simplification (Dubai, 12-13 March 2007).
2Measuring

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training on using the computers and the internet applications. Moreover, problems related to infrastructure limitations as the availability of the computers, the internet cables and the trained employees all over the country. The problem of the infrastructure is escalated especially with the increase of the students 'numbers every year, so the pressures on the current limited infrastructure will be very high. As a result of this low capacity of the infrastructure, the quality of the provided services will be negatively affected and customer 'satisfaction as well. (Hassan, Shehab, and
Peppard, 2010, p4).

In addition, spreading the awareness among the customers on the importance of using the E-services is crucial to deliver the available services efficiently to everybody everywhere timely and efficiently. These limitations if not be tackled by the government , it will be resulted in some deficiency not only that related to the fact that thousands of students try to access the website in a very limited period of time, but also that may affect the promotion for the other E-governmental services among the customers and the customers negatively. (Hassan, Shehab, and Peppard, 2010, p5). IV. Conclusion
The Egyptian government has achieved a successful experience in providing the E-education services that can be a pilot pivotal in other E-government services to guarantee customers’ satisfaction by achieving the main E-government goals. The main goal of the E- governmental services is to get the users satisfaction by ensuring government’s ability to provide its services to the customers close to their residence or proximity and giving the investors the chance to get the services directly. In addition, displaying the government services that have been restructured and providing complete transactions over the networks for some services.
Continuous feedback on E-government service performance is essential to public officials in order to continually improve and enhance their services. This ongoing evaluation should aim to monitor program activities, assess user satisfaction and provide valuable recommendations for further improvements. Governments can implement various strategies for ongoing evaluation including, online quantitative surveys (brief pop-up surveys or more detailed surveys that show up to site visitors and users); qualitative focus groups and interviews with E-service users; log file analysis; and continued usability rate testing.
Governments should incorporate the concepts of customer relationship management (CRM) through E-government interactions with customers. This is an effective way to discover their needs, utilize two-way communications through a satisfaction survey, policy proposal and participation, categorize customers according to their needs and topics, and offer customized information and services (Lee, Gim, and Yoo, 2009).

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There are many important further researches that can be conducted in the field of E-government services and its relationship with the customer and customer satisfaction. , research on a cross cultural basis to make broad assessment of E-service quality across various countries, and on the comparison between the E-service quality of the government and that of a private sector provider of a similar service thus, provide valuable reflections for public E-service delivery reform processes in other words, attempts should be made for benchmarking public service quality against private sector services. Moreover, addressing the concept of relationship quality as a dimension of E-service quality in measuring customers' satisfaction with Egovernment services.

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Smith, B., Fraser, B. T., & McClure, C. R. (2000). Federal information policy and access to Web-based information. Journal of Academic Librarianship, 26, 274–281.
The Egyptian Information Society Initiative for Government Services Delivery http://www.egypt.gov.eg/english/documents/download/Egyptian_Info_Society_Initiat ive_en_05012010133214.zip
The Egyptian E-government http://www.egypt.gov.eg/english/documents/download/e_GovE_en_05012010135100 .zip
U.S. Office of Management and Budget. Digital States and the Second Generation of
Digital Government. Report of Major Findings from the Digital States survey, retrieved from http://www.whitehouse.gov/omb/egov on 11, 2010.
Wang, L., Bretschneider, S., & Gant, J. (2005).Evaluating Web-Based E-government
Services with a Customer-Centric Approach. Appeared in the Proceedings of 38th
Annual Hawaii International Conference on Systems Sciences, Big Island, Hawaii.
West, D. M. (2004). E-government and the Transformation of Service Delivery and
Customer Attitudes. Public Administration Review, 64(1), 15-27.

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VI. Annex 1- Egypt's short country fact sheets:
EGYPT
Eng. Ahmed Kamal Mohamed SHABAN
Projects Manager – E-government Program Ministry of State for Administrative
Development Egypt
Question 1: Have you undertaken or are you undertaking any activity focused on measuring and evaluating E-government in your country? If yes, please explain and state whether they were/are conducted at 1) national level, 2) sectoral level
(e.g. health, education), 3) ministry/agency level or 4) project level.
Egypt has three ICT indicators which are:
1. Indicator of digital availability.
2. Main electronic indicators for measuring the information community.
3. Indicator of technological readiness of public institutions.

1. Indicator of digital availability Institution in charge: Information and Decision
Support Center – Cabinet Frequency of the indicator: quarterly Level of measurement: national Measurement Data: number of mobiles lines subscribers, number of landlines subscribers, cost of Internet access, international bandwidth, number of international domains subscribers, number of Internet users, number of personal computers (“A PC per household” initiative), number of ICT companies, number of Egyptian sites on the Web, number of people working in ICT companies, percentage of literate adults, number of children registered in primary and secondary schools, GDP per capita, population.
2. Main e-indicators for measuring the information community Institution in charge: Central Agency for Public Mobilization and Statistics (CAPMAS)
Frequency of the indicator: Annual Level of measurement: national - sectoral
Measurement Data: communication infrastructure, households, sectors, IT companies, IT clubs, Internet cafes, colleges (public, private, Azhar institutions) universities (public, private, Azhar).
3. Indicator of technological readiness of public institutions Institution in charge:
Ministry of State for Administrative Development Frequency of the indicator:
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biannual Level of measurement: national Measurement Data: preliminary survey of the infrastructure (equipment and hardware, Web connections, software and applications packages, Web presence, human resources, ICT utilization plan, security systems); work cycle and employee performance [civil services and labor force, incentives in the administration and public sectors as well as relations with customers, the status of e-services and level of automation in the institution, the strategy, funding, technical support, partnerships, customer services and relationships with users, factors related to organization and knowledge management, automation of the institution's work cycle (advantages and obstacles), automation readiness]; infrastructure and information systems (connection methods and cost of Internet use, equipment and hardware, connectivity, software and application packages, Internet and related services, security services, agreements and MoUs with ICT companies (partnerships), privacy statements, human resources and IT training).
Since the indicator of technological readiness of government institutions is the closest we have to measuring E-government, the answer to questions about E-government indicators can be concluded from data on technological readiness of government institutions. Question 2: What are the main purpose and objective of E-government measurement and evaluation at national or sectoral level? Are measurable Egovernment targets and goals included in your national or sectoral Egovernment strategy? If yes, have indicators been developed to measure them?
Objectives of measuring and evaluating initiatives:
 Directing development efforts through providing measures and variables of change in government institutions in order to follow progress of different routes and to examine the capacities of each institution in order to help its progress.  Directing development efforts to reach preset values per the indicators set in the general national plan.
 In light of these measurements, accurate information is provided which will help decision and policy makers elaborate accurate and efficient plans in the future. Goals of measuring and evaluating initiatives:
 Enhancing Egypt's ranking regarding the global economic competitiveness indicator.  Measuring and then supporting ICT use in the government administration units.  Supporting government institutions in planning stages and directing investment through highlighting development and improvement of work cycles through better utilization of technology
 Enhancing performance and capacity of civil servants in IT.
 Measuring the impact of the technological readiness indicator on the economic and investment environment in the country.
 Publishing a guide with the names of IT officers in the administration and various ministries

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Creating a technological work environment to allow government institutions to benefit from capacities provided by the government as the main infrastructure for implementing modern technologies.
 Creating new opportunities for E-government projects.
Measuring and evaluating technological readiness of the Egyptian government is mandatory for ministries and government bodies. Results of E-government evaluation are made available to concerned entities. For instance the head of any institution has the right to view the indicators related to his/her institution. This information is also made available to decision makers in the government.
Implementation mechanisms:
 Setting a framework and guide for administration departments.
 Establishing survey questionnaires to examine the current status of ICT use in administration departments in line with the goals sought by the project.
 Reaching relevant statistical indicators and making them available to decision and policy makers in government.
Submitting recommendations based on those statistics and indicators in order to establish the programs as well as elaborate the policies and laws needed to improve the working environment and elevate the level of workers, enhance services, and develop government performance means in general through better use of available modern technological means.
Question 3: What is the purpose and objective of E-government measurement and evaluation at ministry/agency/project level (e.g. ex ante: to argue the case for new projects, or ex post: to assess efficiency and effectiveness)? Is E-government measurement and evaluation mandatory for ministries and agencies? To whom the results of E-government evaluation is made available (e.g. within the organization, to political decision makers, outside government).
Question 4: Have frameworks/methods/tools been developed and use to measure and evaluate E-government at sectoral / ministry/agency and/or project level? If yes, please indicate which ones and provide a short description below:
Frameworks/method/tools were developed and used to measure and evaluate Egovernment at the level of government:

Please provide a short description of the ticked frameworks/methods/tools below: Official statistics: The Ministry of Communication and Information is undergoing monthly surveys on ICT in Egypt and these statistics are a major source of information. 19

Experts Panels: a number of experts have convened in order to set standards for the measurement of technological readiness in the Egyptian government.
Benchmarking instruments: different government bodies are compared in order to recognize positive experiences.
Service quality standards: measuring the volume of use of the Egyptian government portal and inquiring about the quality of services via the E-government communication center.
Question 5: What are the main obstacles for E-government evaluating in your country? Please indicate them in ascending order (1: most important, 8: least important) Question 6: What kind of E-government data that you are already collecting is available today in your country?

Please list below the data available for each category of data. Please also state whether this data is publicly available and where to find them.
Data on readiness: available through regular international reports. Data on access: available through the ICT ministry. Data on inputs: public data made available to all.
Data on outputs: all e-services are available to the public on the Egyptian government portal. Question 7: What would you see as the main challenges in building common indicators in E-government for the region? What next steps would need to be taken to at regional level to make progress in this area? Main challenges in any attempt to establish common E-government indicators in the region are:



Radical differences in measurement tools and methods from one country to another. Different objectives and results of measurement indicators from one country to another (not regionally only but globally as well).
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Differences in demographic composition of populations as to age groups, level of education and living conditions.
Absence of a unified methodology for measurement adopted by governments.
Measurement data scattered between various government entities so it is hard to access as a result of the volume of the administration.

The next steps to be taken at the regional level to realize progress in establishing common indicators for E-government in the Arab region consist of determining a standard indicator for the region agreeing on:
 Measurement.
 Measurement methods.
 Measurement objectives.


Measurement results.

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