About 50 people came to the Orangelab to listen to diverse presentations about the cross-border implementation of the once-only principle (OOP) in practice. The conference was opened by Dirk Stocksmeier, Head of the ]init[ AG, who welcomed Serge Novaretti and Fleur Breuillin, both from the European Commission.

In their keynote speeches, Novaretti and Breuillin emphasised the importance of the OOP in Europe and endorsed its implementation through the Single Digital Gateway initiative. Novaretti appreciated the joint contribution of both EU funded projects, SCOOP4C and TOOP, to approach the OOP from a citizen and a business perspective.

During the day, diverse cross-border OOP use cases were presented from members of the stakeholder community. They were taken from different environments like the social, health, education and business sector to cover a wide range of implementation scenarios. In the afternoon, speakers and visitors had the opportunity to openly discuss the presented cases in different world café sessions.

Moreover, the project coordinators Maria Wimmer (SCOOP4C) and Robert Krimmer (TOOP) took the occasion to officially sign a Memorandum of Understanding between both projects. “I am happy that we could today formalise what we have been doing successfully throughout the last months: working together on ways to make the OOP a cross-border reality”, Krimmer said.

Both projects were launched in January 2017 and investigate the implementation of the OOP in Europe on a cross-border level. While SCOOP4C is analysing how the OOP can be realised in public services for citizens, TOOP implements multiple pilots to explore the OOP from a businesses’ perspective. Since the very start, both projects are closely working together by sharing their experiences, organising joint workshops and aligning other promotional activities.

The event aimed at creating awareness of the importance of the OOP for administrative burden reduction. It was a good opportunity to demonstrate the interim project findings taken from the first 11 months. Furthermore, the discussion included current drivers, enablers and barriers, which have to be taken into account when exploiting the full potentials of the once-only principle in Europe.

You find more information on the event and all presentations from our conference and other events at our section project materials.