Recently entrusted to coordinate the evolution of the National Interoperability Framework (NIF), ICEPRO implements a new mechanism to foster systematic and large scale implementation of interoperable solutions.

Iceland has decided to push its NIF to play a much bigger role in the eGovernment policy for the years 2017-2020. In this perspective, every eGovernment initiative should contain an evaluation for a need for interoperability on national and/or European level.

To turn this into practice, Iceland Ministry of Finance and Economic Affairs recently mandated ICEPRO (the Icelandic Committee on Trade Procedures and e-Commerce - http://www.icepro.is/) on building up, implementing and monitoring the evolution of the NIF in Iceland. This committee aims to facilitate the e-commerce, the transparence and the user-friendliness linked to e-government procedures and criteria.

As a first step, ICEPRO brings together a group of specialists from key public institutes and ministries. They evaluate the standards and norms documented into the Icelandic NIF, and therefore used in developing the public e-service in the country. “From 10 members now, we target to double the number of specialists by 2017 and to include representatives from civil society, University, Research Centers and private professionals” says Hjörtur Þorgilsson, Chairman of ICEPRO.

Parallel to the formal introduction of this expert group within the public environment by the end of 2016, its members will already pinpoint ongoing key projects for which interoperability can be assessed. As from 2017, all the public sector projects will be monitored using national and/or European interoperability as the evaluation grid. As they are most often part of the concerned project, the experts are expected to play a key feedback role. They will implement the change by elaborating in beforehand and acting in eGovernment projects.