Connectivity

Agency Initiatives - Categories

The Agency Initiatives have been structured around categories, according to which best portrays the relevance of each initiative to achievement of the E-government Strategy:

Category 3: Connectivity

Government agencies have made significant progress towards building infrastructure and networks that will transform the landscape of how they use and exchange information.

These networks have enabled agencies to access sophisticated systems and technologies that were previously beyond the reach of all but the largest organisations. They are also providing important foundations that are fundamentally changing the ways that organisations can work together and services can be delivered. For example:

• Government Shared Network (GSN) – a secure, controlled access “Internet for government” that provides a dedicated, secure, high-speed, nationwide telecommunications infrastructure for Public Service departments, Crown entities and local government
• Kiwi Advanced Research and Education Network (KAREN) – a high-capacity, high-speed connection linking New Zealand’s tertiary institutions, research organisations, libraries, wānanga, schools and museums, and the rest of the world.

Key points

• Robust and powerful networks
• Enabling collaboration
• Cost-effectiveness

Robust and powerful networks

These initiatives are providing agencies with enhanced networking capability for exchanging information and sharing services. KAREN, for example, provides significant peak capacity and total computing power delivered to scientific projects, as well as new ways for scientific communities to share and analyse very large data sets. Data can be transferred through KAREN at up to 10 gigabits per second (10,000 times the speed of a standard broadband connection), enabling seamless two-way interaction and sharing of data. The GSN is also robust, providing agencies with access to a secure voice- and data-capable network, enabling services to be delivered including Internet access, IP telephony, remote access, and offsite data storage.

Enabling collaboration

Each of these initiatives provides a foundation for increased collaboration among agencies. At the telecommunications layer, the GSN shared connection supports secure agency collaboration in data exchange, shared services, and joint service delivery. KAREN allows participants to exchange large volumes of data instantaneously over long distances, and gain access to large-scale national and international infrastructure and innovation networks for research and development-based collaboration.

Cost effectiveness

These initiatives are providing agencies with access to significant telecommunications infrastructure at a reasonable price. They are also reducing duplication of systems and processes, and decreasing the overall investment in and operational costs of multiple systems across government. The GSN, for example, will be cost effective in replacing and rationalising duplicated services currently employed by government agencies. It is expected to deliver a suite of converged voice, video, and data transmission at a lower unit cost than is currently available to many agencies through existing supply arrangements.

Implications

These initiatives will enable important cross-network, value-added services to be developed in the future.

An upgrade of the capacity of KAREN, for example, will further enhance the ability of researchers and educators to access skills, data, and resources outside their host institution for teaching and lecturing purposes, and also to share environmental data, replicate genome databases, and enable high-definition videoconferencing. These benefits will translate into increasing the quality and quantity of scientific output in computer-intensive fields such as bioinformatics, climate simulation, and nano-scale design of new materials, and integrating large engineering projects that involve many partners.

Furthermore, the GSN will provide a foundation for transformational improvement in providing state services as agencies harness the power of joined-up government. The enhanced networking capability will reduce the need for insecure, physical transfer of media in order to exchange information, and will encourage agencies to develop systems which allow direct business-to-business transactions between agencies and with trusted business partners.