Estonia, EU – Baltic States, Good for Business, Internet, Technology

"Estonia has set the course towards leading the creation of a single digital market in the Baltic and Nordic countries. We have created a joint X-Road platform with Finland and recently digitally signed an agreement on cyber security cooperation between the three Baltic states. At today's meeting we discussed with the Swedish minister possibilities for simplifying cross-border business and movement of individuals between Estonia and Sweden with the help of e-services," Michal said.

There is first of all interest in developing data exchange between the countries, Michal added. "Estonia is ready to share its X-Road platform with Sweden like we did with Finland. We also could cooperate in recognizing one another's digital identity which would in the first place benefit both countries' citizens and entrepreneurs who would save time and money. Such a basis would also enable creation of new services for entrepreneurs within and between the countries. Given the importance of Sweden for our economy, each such change will be good for enterprise," the Estonian minister said.

Experts of the Estonian Information System Authority have earlier set up an X-Road test environment at the Stockholm University. The bigger aim is to arrive at three-way data exchanges and common e-services in areas like population register data, taxation, business transactions, social benefits and education between Estonia, Sweden and Finland. In the longer perspective Estonia wants to promote X-Road-type data exchanges between countries more broadly in Europe.

Besides meeting with his Estonian colleague, the Swedish minister visited the e-Estonia showroom in Tallinn where he was acquainted with various Estonian e-services from online voting to e-health, the opportunities offered by X-Road and strategic directions of e-governance development.

Sweden is a leading trading partner for Estonia, ranking as the top export partner and biggest foreign investor. Data of the Bank of Estonia show that 23.4 percent of direct foreign investment in Estonia as of summer 2015 in the amount of 3.8 billion euros came from Sweden. According to data of the commercial register, at the beginning of this year 1,882 businesses with Swedish capital were registered in Estonia, 249 more than a year earlier.