Estonia – National Digital Decade strategic roadmap

• October 19, 2024
• admin

The Estonian strategic roadmap for the Digital Decade developed by the Ministry of Economic Affairs and Communications of Estonia sets out the strategic goals to be achieved by 2030, monitoring their achievement, and the target paths and key measures have been developed.

The report uses the data in the Digital Decade Report 2023 on the National Base Value of the Digital Decade Targets, the EU baseline value for Digital Decade Targets in 2023 and the EU target value for 2030. In 2021, 56% of individuals had at least basic digital skills, which is slightly above the EU average of 54%. In 2021, 28% of individuals in Estonia had above basic digital skills which is two percentage points above the EU average of 26%. In 2021, the percentage of individuals with at least basic level skills in using software for digital content creation was 66%, the same as the EU average.

The Roadmap for Estonia consists of 4 chapters:

• Digital Skills

• Digital Infrastructures

• Digitalisation of Businesses

• Digitalisation of Public Services

Priorities for the development of digital skills

Several initiatives have been implemented in recent years to encourage individuals to attain at least basic digital skills. The lack of digital skill availability is partly addressed by Malta’s National eSkills Strategy 2022-2025 which provides a framework for evaluating existing and introducing new initiatives to promote basic and above basic digital skills and tools that later mean an increase in employment.

In this context, Malta committed to investing in an educational app store further to promote the use of digital tools for learning. The country also increased digital training for teachers, including cybersecurity training as part of the EU-funded CybARverse strategic partnership, thereby jointly promoting digital security and inclusion principles.

Estonia is currently implementing several measures that can help increase the level of digital skills to contribute to the collective efforts to meet the Digital Decade target of at least 80% of the population having at least basic digital skills.

Key challenges to overcome

While Malta is expected to make an important contribution to the 2030 target of having at least 80% of the population equipped with basic digital skills, a key challenge is to ensure that its contribution aligns with the Digital Decade objective to bridge digital divides.

Specific challenges:

• Challenge 1 – Declining mathematical competency of the younger student population.

  • Measures 5, 9, 10, 12, and 15 are expected to address the above challenge.

• Challenge 2 – Digital skills shortage.

  • Measures 1, 2, 3, 5, 14, and 15 are expected to address the above challenge.

• Challenge 3 – Bridging the digital divide and targeting marginalised segments of society.

  • Measures 11, 13, and 14 are expected to address the above challenge.