Countries around the globe have continued investing in
electronic payment methods despite the economic downturn and
austerity measures, says the 2011 Government e-payments
Adoption Ranking (GEAR),
a study commissioned by Visa and
published by The Economist Intelligence Unit (EIU).

More than one-third of the 62 countries
included in the 2011 GEAR study received the highest possible score
for their efforts to promote e-payment security. And more than 90%
of the countries have systems in place to enable citizens to
calculate and file their income taxes.

“The overall trend since 2007 is for
governments to continue to make commitments to the development of
e-payment platforms. There is increased ease and efficiency in the
way citizens and businesses conduct transactions with their
governments,” said Lucy Hurst, associate director of custom
research at EIU.

The study shows that the e-government
initiatives have grown in correlation to the rise in alternative
payment methods and broadband networks. The majority of the
countries included in the survey have developed 3G, 4G and other
mobile phone technologies, according to the study.

Along with security systems, this improvement
is gradually bringing consumers to trust in governmental electronic
payments alternatives, Visa concluded.

 

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Key statistics

Other key trends observed by the 2011 GEAR
included:

  • More than 86% of national governments have a VAT or tax
    collection system,
  • About 84% of the countries have a system for the collection of
    fines and tolls,76% percent of the governments surveyed have a
    procurement system in place.

Trust is the “key barrier to citizen adoption
of government e-payments”, according to Visa and the EIU.

Despite the growth of e-gov initiatives
observed since 2007, e-payments still have little penetration in
services like obtaining/paying for an ID card, requesting
unemployment, workers’ compensation and welfare benefits, and
disbursement of loans to businesses, reported EIU.

 

Study profile

GEAR 2011 analysed the performance of
62 countries for 37 indicators across the categories:
Citizen-to-Government; Government-to-Citizen;
Business-to-Government; Government-to-Business; Infrastructure;
Social and Economic Context; and Policy Context.

The countries included in the EIU report account for more than
80% of world population and an estimated 94% of total world
GDP.

The GEAR study also looked to the future and
estimated that e-gov initiatives implementation and improvements
will come along with varied transformations in several countries.
Amongst them, the report foresees that:

financial inclusion, particularly in
developing markets. Mobile payments adoption in economies like
Africa and Latin America will help

  • an uptake in mobile payments,
  • automating standard services (including tax
    refunds and social security contributions), 
  • e-payment security measures,
  • collaborations between the public and private
    sectors on e-payment initiatives.