JEDDAH, 25 May 2005 — Over 1,000 professional senior government officials, ministerial delegations, IT managers, analysts and academics attended the 11th GCC e-Government Forum. The five-day event is wraps up its activities today in Dubai.
The event is being sponsored and supported by leading organizations such as Dubai e-Government Committee, Oracle, Microsoft, Intel, Computer Associates, Hewlett-Packard, Cisco Systems, TIBCO, DTK Computers, Tejari, Middle East, Fuego & BMI Systems, TrippLite, Smart Square, House of Development, Huawei, Gulf Data International, Viewnet Technologies, Ducont, C1 India, Star Systems, Harf, Arab Link and sister publication Al-Eqtisadiah.
On Monday, Hussain Lootah, chairman, e-Government Steering Committee, Dubai Municipality presented a case study on its achievements in e-government and shared with participants the organization’s vision for the future. He talked about the various e-services being provided by Dubai Municipality and their plans for facilitating citizen interaction with the organization.
Yesterday, Prince Mohammed ibn Saud ibn Khaled, general manager of the Information and Studies Center at the Saudi Ministry of Foreign Affairs, presented a case study on the ministry’s implementation of e-government and how it used the technology to serve citizens and businesses and educate society and its own employees to adapt to the new technology. Oman’s speaker, Dhiab Al-Abri, project manager at the Ministry of Civil Services, talked about his government’s start in developing administrative services for human resources and that 90 percent of the ministries are scheduled for implementing the technology.
Other countries that presented their experiences with e-government included China, India, Singapore, Brunei, Canada and the US. Speaking about the event, Ali Al Kamali, managing director of the organizers Datamatix said, “Over the past 10 years, the conference has come to address crucial issues facing successful e-government initiatives in the GCC. It has been our aim to bring the best practices and cutting-edge knowledge from across the world to the forum for regional professionals.”
“Day one of the forum featured several high-quality presentations and case studies by e-government experts from the GCC and abroad. Delegates were provided with useful insights into the challenges facing e-government in the future, infrastructure, integration and re-engineering strategies for GCC e-government implementations.”
James W. Jarrett, vice president, legal and government affairs, Intel Corporation, presented a session on “How technology innovations and e-government can improve the quality of government operations.”
