National Digital Decade strategic roadmap of Cyprus

The Cyprus strategic roadmap for the Digital Decade sets out the strategic goals to be achieved by 2030, monitoring their achievement, and the target paths and key measures have been developed. The strategy covers key sectors such as digital skills, infrastructure, business digitalisation, and public services.

The report uses data from the Digital Decade Report 2023 on the national base value of the digital decade targets, the EU baseline value for digital decade targets in 2023, and the EU target value for 2030.

Key components:

Digital skills:

• Specific national trajectories and targets for digital skills in Cyprus include addressing digital skill gaps among older citizens and underrepresented groups, such as women and people in rural areas.
• The plan focuses on upskilling and reskilling the workforce with investments in digital education programs.

Cyprus will invest around 24M euros in the development of digital skills by 2026, with the following measures:

• Digital transformation of school units with the aim of enhancing digital skills and skills related to
  Science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) education (13.8M euros).
• e-skills Action Plan – implementation of specific actions (1.85M euros).
• Skilling, reskilling and upskilling – digital skills (8.42M euros).

Digital infrastructure:

• A key goal is to ensure that all populated areas in Cyprus are covered by high-speed Very High-Capacity Networks (VHCNs), with gigabit-capable internet for all homes and businesses by 2030.
• 5G networks will be expanded to cover 100% of the population by 2025.
• The roadmap also focuses on the development of advanced digital infrastructure, including fibre optics and quantum computing projects.

The digitalisation of businesses:

• The strategy sets a goal that by 2030, 75% of Cypriot enterprises will have adopted advanced digital technologies such as cloud computing, big data, and AI.
• The strategy puts emphasis on ensuring that 90% of small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) have at least a basic level of digital intensity.

Digitalisation of public services:

• By 2030, the plan aims for 100% of key public services in Cyprus to be available online.
• The strategy also targets the full adoption of electronic health records (EHR) and electronic identification (eID) systems by all citizens.
• The government intends to redesign its digital service delivery by creating a ‘Digital Services Factory,’ streamlining public service processes, and reducing project life cycles for public sector digital initiatives.

Budget and funding:

The roadmap involves significant investments across digital infrastructures and services. EU funds, national resources, and private investments are expected to support the ambitious targets, with dedicated funds for business digitalisation and the development of public digital services.