Hessa Bu Humaid Highlights UAE Progress in Public services

Her Excellency Hessa Bint Essa Buhumaid, Minister of Community Development, headed the UAE delegation in the United Nations Public Service Day and Awards Ceremony which was held between 24-26 June 2019 in Kaku, Azerbaijan. The forum was organized by the United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs (UNDSEA) in observance of the United Nations Public Service Day coinciding 23^rd June every year, under the title “Achieving Sustainable Development Goals through Effective Delivery of Services, Innovative Transformation and Accountable Institutions”.  The speech of Her Excellency the UAE Minister of Community Development highlighted the UAE Journey in Government Services and Commitment to apply the UN agenda of Sustainable Development 2030.

The forum which was opened by Her Excellency Mrs. Mehriban Aliyeva, First Vice-president of the Republic of Azerbaijan in the attendance of His Excellency Mr. Liu Zhenmin, United Nations Under-Secretary-General for Economic and Social Affairs, focused on how to transform public institutions and equip them with the capacities to implement the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development. The participants also discussed emerging issues and trends, good practices, as well as strategies and approaches to innovative governance. The forum was also attended by international and regional participants including ministers, senior government officials, mayors and representatives from civil society, academia, private sector, and international and regional organizations.

In a presentation about the “UAE Journey in Public Services” delivered during her participation in the forum, Her Excellency Hessa Bint Essa Buhumaid emphasized that the United Arab Emirates seeks to be among the best countries in the world by 2021, and was a strong advocate for the formulation of the agenda 2030.  The UAE’s commitment to sustainable development is at the heart of the country’s vision for its future. The ideas of sustainable development permeate UAE’s national development plan, vision 2021, and the plans of the seven emirates.

Her Excellency Hessa Bint Essa Buhumaid noted the efforts of the National Committee on Sustainable Development Goals efforts which was formed on January 2017 by the Ministry of Cabinet Affairs and the Future, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation and (12) other federal level government organizations are also members and are responsible for the national implementation for sustainable development goals, monitoring and reporting of progress towards targets and stakeholder engagement. As such, the Ministry of Community Development is responsible for two goals: “End poverty in all forms everywhere”, and “Reduce Inequality within and among countries-society”.

Her Excellency added that the UAE seeks also for achieving its goals by launching the UAE Government Leaders Program, the result based excellence model, 52 National KPIs and the national strategy in 2009.

Her Excellency said: “The United Arab Emirates, through its national KPIs, looks for being among the top 10 countries of advanced network readiness index, today in the 28^th rank, it also strives to be among the top (10) countries in the global innovation index, currently (41) rank, and also looks for achieving rank (1) in the reliability of police services. It also wishes to be among the top (5) countries in the happiness index while now in the 28^th rank.

Her Excellency also highlight several initiatives that are adopted by the UAE government of which: Global Star Rating System for Services, World Government Summit, UAE Drones for Good Award, UAE Innovates, UAE AI & Robotics Award for Good, World Govtecioneers Race, Customer Happiness Factory, Emirates Government Service Excellence Program.

Her Excellency also spoke about the UAE Journey and government goals to improve and develop services noting the establishment of the E-Government Program in 2003, the best mobile government service award and national agenda. The E-government abides to provide services (24/7) for (365) days and after the launch of the mGovernment, the UAE launched the Best mGovernment Service Award. She also mentioned that the customer happiness factory provides innovative tools that focus on the customers’ perspective and journey to assist in public services delivery, specifically the services that are related to a citizen life cycle.

Her Excellency Hessa Buhumaid then highlighted the service “Mabrook ma Yak”- i.e congratulations for your newborn baby-, which assist the applicant to attain 5 of the most important documents in one visit and “Basher” to enable the beneficiary of attaining all documents pertaining to start their own business in (15) minutes only.

Her Excellency revealed that the ministries and strategies of the United Arab Emirates: Artificial Intelligence, Advanced Sciences, Food Security, UAE Artificial Intelligence 2031, National Program for Artificial Intelligence, UAE Block Chain Strategy 2021, Artificial Intelligence Training Program for Government Employees, UAE Artificial Intelligence Camp “Region’s First Artificial Intelligence”, UAE Artificial Intelligence Council, a specialized council focusing on artificial intelligence to accelerate the roll out of the UAE artificial intelligence strategy 2031.

Speaking about the Ministry of Possibilities, Her Excellency said it is the world’s first virtual ministry to apply design-thinking and experimentation to develop proactive and disruptive solutions to tackle critical issues, bringing together federal and local government teams and the private sector.

At the end of her speech to the United Nations Public Service Forum held in Baku-Azerbaijan, Her Excellency stated that the UAE Ultimate Goals are to be among the best countries by 2021, be the best nation by 2071, be a happy nation that spreads happiness and focus on enhancing the humanitarian assistances. “The UAE next mission and destination is to MARS…. Mars 2117 Project”, Her Excellency ended.