Next Tuesday, 16 May, from 12:30 p.m. to 1:30 p.m., on the occasion of the 2023 edition of ForumPA, the Italian Ministry of Economy and Finance will organise an event entitled “Il Dipartimento del Tesoro e la trasformazione digitale: centralità delle persone, gestione dei dati e innovazione tecnologica” (The Department of the Treasury and digital transformation: the central role of people, data management and technological innovation). The initiative will be held at Palazzo dei Congressi in Rome.

The event will be moderated by the Director General of the Department of the Treasury, Michele Petrocelli, in charge of innovative and transversal projects, and will feature institutional guests and experts such as Alessandro Bacci, General Manager HR - Ministry of Economy and Finance; Stefano Nocentini Senior Executive Partner - Gartner; Luca Verducci, Head of IT Governance and Operations Governance & Transformation - Poste Italiane; Fernanda Faini, Professor of Law and New Technologies, Legal Informatics - University of Pisa.

It will provide a useful opportunity to discuss the latest trends related to the changes currently taking place, together with experts, stakeholders and representatives of the Ministry. The Department is involved in a number of initiatives aimed at implementing models and best practices for organisational change, in line with the national and supranational context. To this end, the projects and initiatives implemented within the framework of the Governance NOP fund will be promoted, with the aim of innovating and digitalising, enhancing the role of people, the real engine of change, with actions aimed at redefining processes and working methods, rethinking environments and spaces, and adopting new policies based on the exploitation of data.

For more information on the programme of the event and the registration form, see the dedicated page.

The efficient management of public assets and the enhancement of their value are of fundamental importance for the Department of the Treasury. In the DTPlus programme, the "Empowered & Digital Public Asset Platform" project aims at strengthening the Public Administration’s ability to manage assets at a central and a local level through the creation of an asset management and enhancement system.

In 2020, the Department carried out several projects dedicated to enhancing the value of public sector real estate by improving the management of data relating to buildings and their respective area.

The use of Business Intelligence tools is enabling a real paradigm shift in the definition of the value and use of real estate assets, moving from an approach geared towards individual housing units to one that takes into account the entire building, thereby promoting more efficient management strategies and building allocations.

This new way of enhancing property is a huge opportunity to improve not only knowledge of the asset, but especially the assessment of its use and reuse for social purposes.

Indeed, thanks to data from local authorities, it is possible to understand how and to what extent public sector real estate can meet actual local needs, such as those of schools and health facilities, and even specific cases of housing demand.
 

The Department of the Treasury's Digital Transformation NOP programme was developed over the 2019-2021 three-year period with the aim to enhance working processes and methods in the areas of financial malfeasance prevention, asset management and public debt. Now that 2021 has ended, it seems useful to review the main innovations introduced by the Governance and Institutional Capacity NOP on the three defined project strands. Indeed, in the last three years, the Department has chosen to embark upon a path of innovation and digitisation, thus enhancing the use of new technologies in order to increase the efficiency of organisational processes and models, as well as data security and accessibility.

1. Prevention of financial malpractice

The project on the prevention of financial malpractice has enabled the implementation of SiMEC, the system designed for the Central Means of Payment AntiFraud Office (Ufficio Centrale Antifrode dei Mezzi di Pagamento, UCAMP) of the Italian Ministry of Economy and Finance, which boasts more than 80,000 users and brings together all the data necessary for monitoring fraud as well as the counterfeiting of cards and the euro, thereby providing a unique point of connection between the private sector and the Public Administration. The functionalities and monitoring areas of SiMEC, which was designed starting from the processes whereby fraud and the counterfeiting of the euro (Banknotes and Coins) and non-cash means of payment (Cards, ATMs, POS) are monitored, were defined starting from the different organisational needs of the organisations involved, especially the banking system, which is the main stakeholder of the project. For this reason, the system was integrated with the National Interbank Network (Rete nazionale interbancaria, RNI) in order to process the most precise data on the Cards area. In 2020, the Department expanded the platform by implementing a Business Intelligence system aimed at enhancing the management and prevention of malpractice with regard to means of payment and adopting a mix of technologies based on Machine Learning, Artificial Intelligence and Investigation & Entities Behaviour Analysis; as a result, the system is now able to recognize, predict and report the trends and characteristics of malpractice phenomena with an increasing level of detail.

2. Asset management

In 2020/2021, the Department carried out several projects dedicated to the central and local management of property assets with a view to enhancing the value of public property assets by improving the management of data relating to buildings and the area concerned. The application of Business Intelligence tools is enabling a real paradigm shift in the definition of the value and use of real estate assets to take place, going from taking into account the single housing unit to the whole building, thus supporting more effective management and building allocation rationales. This new property valorisation model is a huge opportunity to improve not only knowledge of the asset, but especially the better assessment of its use and reuse for social purposes. In fact, thanks to the data coming from local authorities, it is possible to understand how and to what extent public real estate assets can respond to actual local needs, as is the case with school and health facilities, up to specific cases of housing need. .

3. Public Debt Management

The project on public debt management, which is a key issue for economic recovery, and its implications for the management of the Sure funds and the NRRP by means of the GEDI platform, which has replaced several vertical applications intended for the management of public debt, remains to be explored.

From 16 to 18 May, the 2023 edition of ForumPA was held at Palazzo dei Congressi in Rome. The focus of the event was the enhancement of talent in the Public Administration, with digital transformation in the background changing people's lives and work.

MEF's feature, entitled “Il Dipartimento del Tesoro e la trasformazione digitale: centralità delle persone, gestione dei dati e innovazione tecnologica” (The Department of the Treasury and Digital Transformation: the Central Pole of People, Data Management and Technological Innovation), which took place on the opening day of the event, brought together experts and viewpoints as part of a useful dialogue to reflect on data management, people and organisations.

The focus of the debate was the new face of Public Administration, which must redesign its organisational structure by integrating modern technologies to keep up with social and cultural needs.

The event was moderated by Michele Petrocelli, Director General of the Consultancy, Studies and Research, Coordination of Innovative and Transversal Projects area, who introduced the debate by illustrating how the Department has allocated NOP Governance European fund to its multiple project activities, which are aimed at promoting innovation and digitisation.

The round table saw the participation of Stefano Nocentini, Senior Executive Partner – Gartner, who highlighted the need to focus on more effective data management and a new way of rethinking workspaces, Fernanda Faini, Professor of Law and New Technologies, Legal Informatics - University of Pisa, who illustrated how digitisation is destined to change the physiognomy of the PA, Luca Verducci, Head of IT Governance and Operations Governance & Transformation - Poste Italiane, who pointed out that people have been at the heart of Poste's innovation, and Alessandro Bacci, General Manager HR – Italian Ministry of Economy and Finance, who described the cultural change and leadership enhancement in the MEF's organisational processes.

In closing, Petrocelli emphasised the importance of the event: "Important moments such as the ForumPA event hosting us enable us to make the most of our professional life to reflect together on the magnitude of the scope of change of the digital transformation and on the right direction in which we want to proceed in order to seize its opportunities".

You can review the event by clicking on the following link: FORUM PA 2023 | Spazio MEF. Centralità delle persone, gestione dei dati e innovazione tecnologica.
 

The "La spesa ICT nella PA italiana 2020", report (2020 ICT spending in the Italian PA), which has reached its third edition, has accompanied the drafting of the 2020-2022 Three-Year Plan for IT, gathering and analysing data and information on a set of public administrations that collectively account for a large part of Italian public spending on Information and Communication Technologies (ICT).

“The analysis of as many as 629 ICT projects carried out by central and local administrations shows that investments in Infrastructure and Platforms hold the lion’s share in terms of expenditure – 41% and 33% respectively –, followed by investments for the implementation of Digital Services, which account for 19%.

The estimated 2020 ICT spending for the Italian Public Administration – based on a projection using the data that emerged from the panel analysis – is about 6.2 billion euros and shows a 7% yearly growth between 2017 and 2020, going from a total of about 2.2 billion euros to almost 2.7 billion euros, even though, as illustrated in the report, the trend is not uniform across the sectors of central and local administrations.”

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