Estonia

Estonia became a rapidly developing, open, and Western-minded Nordic country. The e-government model and the digital society of Estonia are also an example for many developed countries in the West nowadays.

It is singing together that built us as a nation. It is singing together that helped us carry freedom in our hearts during the 50 years of Soviet occupation. Throughout centuries, Estonian song celebrations have played an important role in Estonian national identity.

Estonia, Finland, and the Tallinn-Helsinki tunnel together with Rail Baltic have a potentially important role in the new global connection between Europe and Asia. The Norwegian experts have calculated that the distance between Shanghai and Hamburg is 12 277 nautical miles, a voyage time of 39 days.

It is obvious that e-Estonia will never be ready. The rapid development of technology continues to create new opportunities for changing as a society. Yet, at the beginning of 2018, we are without a doubt the best e-state in the world.

Russian President Vladimir Putin has by decree named a regiment of the Russian air force after the Estonian capital, Tallinn. In the former Soviet republic this has been regarded as a provocation, with good reason.

Estonia is to pass a legislation that will transform the transport sector and help to improve the environmental dimension of public behavior. Why is it important to foster the development of Taxify, Uber, Wisemile, Starship, and other technological companies that transform public transport and logistics in Europe?

Estonia could become the first country in the world with virtual currency, the Estcoin. The problem is that the country’s official currency is Euro and membership in the Eurozone does not allow having any other parallel cryptocurrency.

The tendencies towards greater intrusion into people\'s privacy were visible well before 9/11 and can be imagined even without the elements of its influence. The transition to e-prescriptions, online banking and voting – these are daily routines in Estonia and will be rather sooner than later in other parts of the Western world as well.

Creating robotic Twitter accounts which generate automatic content on a selected topic became one of the most useful tools in the Kremiln’s disinformation propaganda. Over 80% of Russia-language tweets and almost half the English-language tweets on the NATO presence in Eastern Europe is created by pro-Kremiln robotic accounts.

There is a long history of schooling in Estonia, education is highly valued. As an IT-country, Estonia is working on better integration of IT into curricula. Our challenges are related to demographic changes, changes in school network and making teaching a more attractive profession.