Omantel, the sultanate’s most trusted telecoms provider, in partnership with ‘Rudha’ and ‘Point’ celebrated the launch of the first Omani open e-learning platform ‘Edlal’, in the presence of a large number of people interested in entrepreneurship and CSR and media representatives in Oman.
The event highlighted visions and plans of the project in the coming stages, which will contribute towards growing a knowledge-based economy built on innovation, engagement and new technologies.
Laila Mohammed al Wahaibi, CSR manager, Omantel, said, “We are very proud today to launch Edlal, which is an innovative platform designed to share experiences, knowledge and skills between experts and young people.
“This knowledge-based platform aims to contribute in preparing young Omanis to join the workforce by equipping them with the required skills and knowledge for the market. It also plays a role in enhancing the Arabic language content on the Internet with timely and reliable information.
“On the other hand, the Edlal platform will contribute in highlighting young Omani talents, and present them to the Arab world. At Omantel, we are fully aware that the future will largely depend on innovation in information technology, which has been part of all aspects of our lives. Edlal will enhance youth capabilities and equip them with the needed skills to achieve success.”
Mohammed Salim al Wahaibi, CEO of Rudha Oman, said that Edlal will be one of the solutions to enhance youth skills by focusing on areas that are important for the job market. He said, “The vision of Edlal is to help equip Omani youth with the necessary skills to enter the job market and to make the latest and best-practice learning materials in Arabic language available.
“The materials on the platform focus on entrepreneurship and knowledge-based economy drivers, including majors in programming, computer science, economy and administration, among other relevant subjects. We expect that the platform will see a large turnout from the youth looking to boost its knowledge and skills in a way that they will benefit from in the future.
“The platform is built to share knowledge, promote its utilisation and the development of young talents to equip them for the future through video clips backed with features that contribute in making educational material fun and enriching for all. We are targeting from this platform knowledge seekers and students of universities and colleges as well as entrepreneurs and job seekers. The Edlal platform will contribute in highlighting the sultanate as a source of Arabic content knowledge and aspire to be the pioneers in this area.
Laila added, “Omantel’s 3.0 transformation strategy was launched at the beginning of 2016 and it aims at bridging the digital divide across all segments of society in the sultanate. With this goal in mind, we partnered with Rudha and Point to launch the Edlal platform, which will translate Omantel’s strategy in reality and contribute in equipping today’s youth with the required skills to make their way in the future and for the nation to achieve sustainable and continuous development.
“Omantel staff will participate in the Edlal platform by providing a range of practical workshops and seminars to enrich them by experiences of those employees in several areas of leadership, management and specialist technical areas in the telecommunications sector.”
Highlighting the essential partnership which underpins the success of Edlal, Wahaibi added, “Omantel is one of the leading companies that support innovation in the sultanate. We are pleased to partner with Omantel in this ground-breaking project, which will allow us to offer greater opportunities for the Omani youth to achieve success and develop their knowledge and skills, for the betterment of everyone in the sultanate.
“Oman is considered as one of the nations with the highest percentage of youth among the general population, and with Edlal, we work to develop this enormous potential in the best possible way.”
One of the significant added features for Edlal is that it presents knowledge content in Arabic, which is important as it is trying to solve a vital weakness in the scarcity of Arabic e-content in the Middle East generally, which does not exceed three per cent, according to an international study in this field.
Edlal approves Arabic as the main language of the platform which is an added feature, increasing the importance of this initiative and enhancing the levels of participation by Omani youth, while at the same time highlighting the Omani contribution in boosting the Arabic content on the Internet.
Joining hands with the community is an integral part of Omantel’s strategy to achieve success, while investing in social development is an integral part of achieving economic success for everyone in Oman. Therefore, the company has through the years consistently allocated part of its annual budget for CSR, which is selected carefully to ensure sustainability of the institutions in need. In 2016, Omantel’s CSR investments exceeded RO2mn.