The United Arab Emirates (UAE) Digital Economy Council recently convened to showcase the nation’s remarkable strides in digital adoption. Chaired by Omar bin Sultan Al Olama, the Minister of State for Artificial Intelligence, Digital Economy, and Remote Work Applications, the council affirmed the UAE government’s proactive stance in crafting visionary goals and initiatives to spearhead a cutting-edge digital economy. Al Olama emphasized the government’s commitment to amplifying the role of digital technologies in diversifying the economy away from oil dependency.
This commitment aligns with the national strategy for the digital economy, aiming to substantially boost the digital sector’s contribution to the non-oil GDP over the next decade. During the meeting held at the Securities and Commodities Authority in Dubai, the council delved into various strategic initiatives. These initiatives encompass enhancing digital infrastructure, promoting digital transactions, fostering e-commerce, advancing financial technologies (fintech), catalyzing investment in digital sectors, nurturing digital skills, supporting small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs), and enhancing data collection methodologies for digital economy statistics.
Of notable mention were the significant advancements in digital infrastructure and technology adoption. Notably, the utilization of digital signatures surged by 216 percent in 2023, while blockchain technology witnessed adoption by multiple entities, including banks, exchange houses, and insurance companies. Furthermore, the council discussed the rollout of innovative digital services across federal networks. These services encompass cutting-edge capabilities like voice-to-text and text-to-voice conversion, language translation, emotion analysis, key phrase extraction, and access to high-performance computing resources for machine learning applications.
Other topics under scrutiny included government service standards, data center distribution, cloud computing deployment across Gulf countries, and the performance of internet networks, particularly the fifth-generation (5G) network. Impressively, the UAE led the Middle East in internet exchange traffic and global rankings for 5G network speeds in 2023. Noteworthy statistics highlighted during the meeting include the adoption rate of the sixth version of the Internet Protocol, which reached 50.7 percent in January 2024, and the nation’s achievement of 100 percent mobile network coverage.