Europe's public administrations must make open source part of their IT-strategy and use open standards on a 'comply or explain' basis. These are two of the policy recommendations made by the Osepa-consortium - twelve European public administrations and the University of Sheffield - following a conference held in the Czech city of Jihlava this past week.
"Open source offers public stakeholders a set of cost-effective, re-usable tools and resources that can give impetus to innovation, entrepreneurship and economic growth", the consortium writes in a policy declaration that it will submit to the European Commission. The statement will also be made available on the consortium's website.
"In order for public administrations to serve their role more effectively, they need to take advantage of the benefits of open source software and open standards."
The consortium recommends public authorities develop strategies for dealing with open source licences, procurement and software markets. The groups wants open source to get a fair chance in the market, so advises public administrations to improve their policies: "Tenders must be monitored for software discrimination practices, procurement frameworks and procedures must be updated."
They also call for investment in research and development on open source. The consortium says that this type of software offers public administrations a way to increase the ICT skill of its citizens, fostering e-inclusion. "It should be integrated in the educational system, both regionally and nationally."
The Osepa-project, funded in part by the European Regional Development Fund, will be completed at the end of 2012. In the past few years, it produced several guidelines on open source and came up with policy recommendations. It organised two public conferences and several workshops. It also conducted a large-scale survey on the use of this type of software by European public administration. The results of this survey were also made public this week in Jihlava.
More information:
Osepa
Osepa policy statement (pdf)