Digital Ghana Meets e Estonia Bawumia Holds Talks With Estonia President

A high-level bilateral discussion on the significance of digitalization in a contemporary economy was held Wednesday afternoon in Tallinn, between Ghana, Africa’s fastest digitizing country, and Estonia, renowned as one of the world’s most digitized countries.

The Ghanaian delegation led by Vice President Dr. Mahamudu Bawumia, who has spearheaded Ghana's remarkable digital transformation, and is on a three-day working visit to Estonia held talks with Estonian President, Alar Karis, before also calling on the Prime Minister, Ms. Kaja Kallas and other officials including Luukas Ilves, Undersecretary for Digital Transformation, Government CIO at the Ministry of Economic Affairs and Communications.

As a global leader in digital economic transformation, Dr. Bawumia's visit to Estonia is to examine the remarkable story of the Northern European country vi's a vis Ghana's own digitalization journey which has set Ghana apart as a reference point in Africa.

At all the meetings with the Estonian President, Prime Minister and the Ministry of Economic Affairs, the hosts shared how their country's investment in digitalization and their commitment to implementing same, in over two decades now, has resulted in a massive economic transformation while Dr. Bawumia also shared Ghana's digitalization story of the past seven years and how it is already positively impacting the nation, especially in combating corruption, making things easier for the people and impacting on government revenue.

Interestingly, in spite of being years ahead of Ghana in its digitalization journey, Estonia's digitalization, christened "e-Estonia", shares striking similarities with Digital Ghana in the areas of national identification, addressing system, online government services and financial inclusion.

Digital Ghana vs e-Estonia

Just like the Ghana Card, e-Estonia is built on its digital national identity card system which is mandatory for every Estonian citizen and can also be used as a digital signature without the person being present.

The Estonian national ID is the catalyst for everything including filing tax returns, booking train tickets, banking and even voting just as the Ghana Card is now the basis for many things in Ghana including banking and seeking government services such as applying for passports, drivers license, social security, travel document among others.Another similarity between e-Estonia and Digital Ghana is Estonia's famed e-Government service which has built an online presence for many public services just as the e platform.

Estonia's e-Government has brought over 100 public services online including filling forms online, paying fines, booking an appointment with a doctor, checking the expiry date of licenses and insurance, filling of tax returns and many others, same as thein Ghana.

Financial inclusion is another digital success story Digital Ghana shares with e-Estonia.

It is estimated that 99% of bank transfers in Estonia are made electronically on a mobile phone or a computer, the national ID card or Mobile-ID in the same fashion as in Ghana, mobile money interoperability has become the biggest method for financial transaction.

Dr. Bawumia and his delegation are expected to hold further discussions with Estonian authorities later on Thursday and Friday.