In april 2004, the Dutch administration presented to the parliament its plans for reduction of administrative burden. In the list of most sizable measures, applying digital reporting and XBRL for the standardization and exchange of annual reports takes the first position. The ministry of Justice, responsible for maintaining the applicable laws, expects to save euro 420 million between now and 2008 for the benefit of the companies in The Netherlands.

The summary of measures for reducing administrative burden, as presented by the minister of Finance, shows initiatives to strike through superfluous rules and regulations. Adherence to necessary rules will be made possible through less time consuming and costly processes. The Dutch industry has been closely involved in defining these plans. The total savings amount to euro 3 billion.

The ministry of Justice concentrates its ambitions around digital reporting. According to this ministry, XBRL can be used not only for regulatory annual reporting, but also for tax returns, statistic reporting, social security reporting and others. By standardizing financial and non-financial definitions, the authorities need to request information less frequently. Through a tight integration with the financial systems of the companies, the production of reporting can be considerably less time consuming. As expected, the benefits of digital reporting will extend beyond the term of the administration; total benefits are expected to reach euro 420 million by 2008.

In the past months XBRL The Netherlands has put a lot of effort in informing the authorities about the specifics and potential of XBRL. Semansys Technologies has successfully introduced XBRL to de-central government and realized the world's first closed loop implementation of digital reporting featuring XBRL. All this contributed a great deal to the promising plans presented by the Dutch government. Semansys will be actively involved in the realization.