{
  "title": "The Digital Accelerator: Revving Up Government in Asia",
  "publication": "IMF Blog, September 26, 2018",
  "sourceUrl": "https://www.imf.org/en/blogs/articles/2018/09/26/blog-the-digital-accelerator-revving-up-government-in-asia",
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  "summary": "Asia’s digital revolution is reshaping businesses and government operations across the region.",
  "sections": [
    {
      "heading": "Overview and context",
      "content": "- Asia’s digital revolution is reshaping businesses and government operations across the region.\n- Authors: Vitor Gaspar, Chang Yong Rhee. Date: September 26, 2018.\n- Examples cited: Alibaba, Rakuten, Go-Jek, Paytm, and widespread industrial robot use for manufacturing."
    },
    {
      "heading": "Benefits from eGovernment",
      "content": "- Digitalization gives policymakers greater access to timely and accurate data, enabling better policy design and implementation.\n- India’s Aadhaar:\n  - Provides a unique 12-digit ID number for 1.2 billion residents in India.\n  - Linked to social programs, including liquefied petroleum gas subsidies.\n  - In 2013, linking Aadhaar to the liquefied petroleum gas program helped prevent claims from ghost beneficiaries or multiple claims.\n  - Subsidies transferred directly to Aadhaar-linked bank accounts, bypassing dealers and improving support for the poor.\n- Philippines’ Listahanan:\n  - Digital registry serves as a gateway for as many as 52 social programs.\n  - 75 percent of the population registered.\n- Indonesia:\n  - Digital social registries have helped expand the coverage of conditional cash transfer programs.\n- Other public service and public financial management uses:\n  - Bangladesh uses smart water meters to monitor water quality.\n  - Bhutan’s e-tool has helped standardize project appraisal and selection for public investment.\n- Revenue-side digitalization:\n  - e-filing, e-payments, and e-customs initiatives are common in Singapore, Malaysia, Vietnam, Indonesia, and Thailand.\n  - In Malaysia, ongoing efforts in e-filing and e-payments have reduced compliance time by 30 percent."
    },
    {
      "heading": "Challenges of going digital",
      "content": "- Cybersecurity and fraud:\n  - Increased use of digital technologies raises risks of cyberattacks; hackers can steal private information and disrupt government functions.\n  - Digital environments are target-rich for fraudsters, including in cryptocurrency exchanges.\n- Tax base and revenue risks:\n  - Digitalization can reduce tax revenues when services shift to small-scale transactions (e.g., tourists using private homes instead of taxed hotels) that fall below tax thresholds.\n  - The digital economy can facilitate profit shifting abroad, out of reach of tax authorities.\n- Digital access gaps:\n  - More than half of those without access to the internet live in Asia.\n  - Broadband subscriptions have increased, but a widening gap exists between leaders and less advanced peers.\n  - Less than one percent of Myanmar’s inhabitants have access to fixed broadband networks compared to over 25 percent in Singapore.\n  - eGovernment depends on population access to digital services.\n- Uneven progress across countries:\n  - Korea, Singapore, Japan, and Malaysia rank in the world’s top ten of digital government.\n  - India outperforms advanced economies, on average.\n  - China, Sri Lanka, Indonesia, and Thailand outperform their emerging market peers.\n  - Small islands and fragile states (e.g., Myanmar, Tuvalu, the Marshall Islands) have struggled to make significant advances in eGovernment."
    },
    {
      "heading": "Policy recommendations and actions",
      "content": "- Strengthen cybersecurity:\n  - Establish agencies to oversee cybersecurity strategy and operations (examples: Singapore and Malaysia).\n- Protect tax revenues and monitor digital impacts:\n  - Governments should monitor how digitalization affects revenues and consider policy responses.\n  - If digitalization shifts services to smaller firms below tax thresholds, governments may choose to revisit current thresholds and change them to tax similar activities.\n- Leverage digitalization to improve tax collection:\n  - Digital tools can make it easier to collect data on financial transactions and improve tax collection.\n  - Closing half the distance to the digitalization frontier could bring in more than one percentage point of GDP of value added tax revenue in ASEAN economies.\n- Expand digital access and infrastructure:\n  - Countries with unreliable internet access should enable early investments in digital infrastructure, like broadband technology, to ensure inclusion and to reap the benefits of digitalization.\n- Build fiscal institutions:\n  - All countries need to build fiscal institutions to manage design, planning, budgeting, and implementation of digitalization policies."
    },
    {
      "heading": "Conclusion",
      "content": "- With comprehensive policy actions on multiple fronts, Asian economies can continue to drive the digital revolution and extend the digital frontier for themselves and other government innovators worldwide.\n\nThe Digital Accelerator: Revving Up Government in Asia — Vitor Gaspar, Chang Yong Rhee (September 26, 2018).\n\n---\n\n\n References\n\n- robots\n- experience\n- cryptocurrency\n- https://www.imf.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/09/eng-september-20-digitaladoption1-1.png\n- https://www.imf.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/09/eng-september-20-digitaladoption2.png\n- https://www.imf.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/09/eng-september-20-digitaladoption3-1-4.png\n\nSource: https://www.imf.org/en/blogs/articles/2018/09/26/blog-the-digital-accelerator-revving-up-government-in-asia"
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    "Authors: Vitor Gaspar, Chang Yong Rhee",
    "Published: September 26, 2018",
    "Asia’s digital revolution is reshaping businesses and government operations across the region.",
    "Authors: Vitor Gaspar, Chang Yong Rhee. Date: September 26, 2018.",
    "Examples cited: Alibaba, Rakuten, Go-Jek, Paytm, and widespread industrial robot use for manufacturing.",
    "Digitalization gives policymakers greater access to timely and accurate data, enabling better policy design and implementation.",
    "India’s Aadhaar:",
    "Philippines’ Listahanan:",
    "Indonesia:",
    "Other public service and public financial management uses:",
    "Revenue-side digitalization:",
    "Cybersecurity and fraud:",
    "Tax base and revenue risks:",
    "Digital access gaps:",
    "Uneven progress across countries:",
    "Strengthen cybersecurity:",
    "Protect tax revenues and monitor digital impacts:",
    "Leverage digitalization to improve tax collection:",
    "Expand digital access and infrastructure:",
    "Build fiscal institutions:",
    "With comprehensive policy actions on multiple fronts, Asian economies can continue to drive the digital revolution and extend the digital frontier for themselves and other government innovators worldwide.",
    "[robots](https://blogs.imf.org/2018/08/29/chart-of-the-week-invest-in-robots-and-people-in-asia/)",
    "[experience](http://www.imf.org/en/Publications/CR/Issues/2018/08/06/India-2018-Article-IV-Consultation-Press-Release-Staff-Report-and-Statement-by-the-Executive-46155)",
    "[cryptocurrency](https://blogs.imf.org/2018/06/22/estimating-cyber-risk-for-the-financial-sector/)",
    "[https://www.imf.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/09/eng-september-20-digitaladoption1-1.png](https://www.imf.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/09/eng-september-20-digitaladoption1-1.png)",
    "[https://www.imf.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/09/eng-september-20-digitaladoption2.png](https://www.imf.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/09/eng-september-20-digitaladoption2.png)",
    "[https://www.imf.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/09/eng-september-20-digitaladoption3-1-4.png](https://www.imf.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/09/eng-september-20-digitaladoption3-1-4.png)"
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