The Romanian Court of Accounts receives digital transformation and data governance support from the European Commission, through the Directorate-General for Structural Reform Support (DG REFORM), the supreme audit institution said on Monday in a release, following a meeting between government officials and members of the teams involved in the project.
DG REFORM provides technical support for the implementation of the project "Digital transformation for regional and local public administration - Technical support for the Romanian Court of Accounts - Digitalization and Data Governance".
Participating in the meeting were Court of Accounts president Mihai Busuioc, and DG RREFORM head Nathalie Berger.
The project is aimed at the implementation at the Romanian Court of Accounts of a standard and practices regarding data governance and interoperability with other entities, the cited source shows.
"At the Court of Accounts, we have set ourselves as a guideline for the specific activity the widespread use of data and data analysis in audit missions, with the main goal of reducing the time allocated to our missions and improving the quality of the opinions and conclusions formulated. The results of this practice are already visible and are gratifying. By using the data sets identified at entities such as the Finance Ministry or the Digital Transformation Authority, in conjunction with media analyses, we have managed to significantly reduce the time allocated to an audit mission. We continue the effort towards the extensive use of data in order to optimize the allocation of resources and increase the quality of the audit, and the results so far give us hope," said Mihai Busuioc.
The project pursues the development of a data management strategy, as well as defining an information security strategy. New information exchange agreements will also be developed that will take into account concrete elements of the exchange process. All these activities will be accompanied by a program to increase administrative capacity through professional training on the systematic distribution (classification) of data, the protection of documents and information.
The project is also included in the digitalisation strategy of the Court of Accounts, as a preliminary stage of the implementation of the risk analysis system based on big-data and data analytics technologies.
The European Commission's DG REFORM provides technical support to the Romanian Court of Accounts with the implementation of the digitalisation strategy, focusing on interoperability, electronic exchange of information through partnerships and protocols, improving security, promoting confidentiality, strengthening digital capacities and maintaining transparency internally and externally. The project we have launched will support the Court in building a solid framework for data governance, which will facilitate the achievement of the strategy's objectives. DG REFORM will assist with the development of a comprehensive organisational framework for data management between the central structure of the Court and the county chambers of accounts, but also externally, with various data providers within the central public administration and audited entities. Digitalisation will reduce the time allocated to audit missions, resulting in streamlining and the reduction of the administrative burden, which is an important horizontal factor for increasing competitiveness, as presented by the European Commission in the Competitiveness Compass, said Nathalie Berger.
The project's implementation is estimated to benefit both the Court's staff - mainly external public auditors - and the approximately 13,500 public entities under the scope of Romania's supreme audit institution. The activities included in the project will also have an impact on public institutions that provide data in electronic format to support audit cross-checks.
The Technical Support Instrument is the main instrument whereby the European Commission supports member states in the process of designing and implementing reforms that favor economic growth and inclusion.
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