Minister for Communications, Energy and Natural Resources Pat Rabbitte today launched the Government’s national digital strategy entitled Doing More with Digital at Trinity College Dublin.
The National Digital Strategy focusses on the role of Government and society in fostering digital engagement and highlights the social and economic benefits that can accrue."
Under the initial phase of the Strategy small companies will be able to avail of vouchers worth up to €2,500 to help get tradining online; secondary schools will receive 100Mb/s broadband connections; and digital literacy schemes like BenefIT4 will receive €1.4 million in funding to provide basic digital skills to 24,000 so-called ‘non-liners’. The scheme aims to get 288,000 more people online by 2016.
Research commissioned as part of the National Digital Strategy showed that digital now accounts for 4.4% of GDP and supports 95,000 jobs. It means that in jobs terms digital has become as big an industry in Ireland as Agriculture, Forestry and Fishing and just shy of financial services in scale. The research also demonstrates that the relative importance of digital is growing at 16% per year, around 10 times the rate of growth of the rest of the economy.
Announcing a new initiative, Minister Rabbitte (pictured) said: "Companies which trade online are proven to grow faster than those which don’t, and it is critical that the backbone of our economy, small traditional businesses, don’t get left behind. That is why this strategy will for the first time provide financing for smaller businesses to develop their online trading presence and begin to reap the benefits of the online market… The digital economy provides new challenges and demands for our workforce and it is for this reason that the NDS will be spearheading digital education programs both for our youngest citizens and our older non-liners."
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