Prime Minister Iurie Leancă made the first transaction using M-pay and stressed the importance of libraries for the Moldovan people. "I think that it is very important that a library has been selected to launch such a useful and important service for the community,” Leancă said. “I hope that the excellent conditions that the library offers will motivate both children and adults [to] open the doors of this institution more often.”
In addition to the prime minister, those in attendance included the governor of the National Bank of Moldova, partners of the E-government Center of Moldova, bank directors, local public administrators, librarians and library patrons. By going beyond traditional boundaries, libraries in Moldova are ready to serve communities in new, innovative ways while encouraging technological literacy.
Orhei resident Larisa Dahnovici was one of the first to try the online payment service and underscored its ease. “The service is very convenient,” said Dahnovici. “There is no need to stand in line and if I encounter any problems, I know whom to address: the librarian."
Speakers at the event highlighted the importance of public libraries as critical community centers that connect citizens to electronic services. They also underlined the significant role that librarians play in promoting, connecting and training Moldovan citizens in technology. Because of this, the government can employ existing resources to reach its development goals instead of establishing new mechanisms for promoting services at community levels.
M-pay is also a part of the Moldova Governance E-transformation agenda, implemented in order to enhance government efficiency and transparency as well as improve living standards in the country.
The Novateca program gains an in-depth understanding of the opportunities for providing wide-scale public access to the Internet through existing public library networks. While implementing the two-year planning and pilot grant supported by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation and USAID, IREX will network with a wide range of stakeholders, provide training to librarians and pilot public access to the Internet in a number of libraries.
