FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Contact:
Marino Marcich, ODF Alliance, +1.202.789.4450,
Graham Taylor, OpenForum Europe, +44 1372 815168,
Beth Dozier, Rational PR, +1.202.429.1833,

Washington, DC, February 25, 2009.  The OpenDocument Format (ODF) is steadily achieving continent-wide support in Europe, with the United Kingdom today joining the growing ranks of governments that have now endorsed its use. 

“Today’s announcement by the UK government reflects the growing demand and support for ODF, especially among governments,” said ODF Alliance managing director Marino Marcich. “Open standards based interoperability through ODF offers real value to governments in terms of choice of IT solutions, savings, and long-term access to data.”

Under the Open Source, Open Standards and Re-Use: Government Action Plan the UK government will specify requirements by reference to open standards and require compliance with open standards in solutions where feasible. The government indicated it will support the use of ODF. It will also work to ensure that government information is available in open formats, and it will make this a required standard for government websites.

“The fact that the UK government will use open standards in its procurement specifications and require solutions to comply with open standards is a significant development that will ensure competition among multiple competing products on different platforms,” said OpenForum Europe chief executive Graham Taylor, who noted the availability of both proprietary and open source ODF-supporting software. “Just as importantly, with ODF, governments can be assured that they will have access to important documents and records 5, 10, even 20 years from now with no worries that software provider will discontinue support for the format.”

Seventeen national and eight provincial governments around the world have now officially endorsed ODF for document exchange. For a comprehensive list and description of pro-ODF government policy initiatives, see: http://www.odfalliance.org/resources/Adoptions-ODF-Dec2008.pdf.

About the ODF Alliance:
The OpenDocument Format Alliance is an organization of governments, academic institutions, non-government organizations and industry dedicated to educating policy makers, IT administrators and the public on the benefits and opportunities of ODF.