ASTANA – The Ministry of Information and Communication has developed a plan to increase Kazakhstan’s digital literacy rate to 83 percent by 2022.
The goal to better equip the Kazakh public to use information technologies in daily life and work is a central aspect of the national Digital Kazakhstan programme.
“We have identified two approaches: central government bodies will train professionals and population, whereas local executive authorities will educate the general public,” Minister of Information and Communication Dauren Abayev announced recently.
Training professionals and the Kazakh population will be the responsibility of the Ministry of Education and Science, Ministry of Labour and Social Protection, Ministry of Healthcare and Ministry of Agriculture.
“These ministries will organise so-called concomitant trainings. For instance, the Ministry of National Economy is holding large-scale trainings for entrepreneurs, which will also include sessions on digital skills. The same will apply during the qualification upgrading trainings for teachers organised by the Ministry of Education,” noted Abayev.
Trainings on digital skills are planned to involve approximately 385,000 professionals.
Approximately eight million people will be taught the basic skills needed to use e-government services and engage in e-commerce.
The Ministry of Information and Communication and the Ministry of National Economy have also specified several levels of digital literacy. The basic level denotes that a person can use computer and mobile gadgets and can obtain information from the internet. The second level involves the ability to use e-government services and make payments, while the third level allows a person to engage in e-commerce, in other words, to buy, sell and promote goods on internet. The fourth level entails use of digital solutions, mobile applications and synchronising several gadgets. Finally, the professional level means that a person is capable of programming on his own.
“To date, the basic level of digital literacy is observed among 77 percent of population. We plan to increase the indicator to 78.5 percent by the end of the year. We have prepared recommendations on methodology, eligibility criteria for training applicants and four training programmes entailing basic digital skills, information and transaction skills, e-commerce skills,” said Abayev.
