The General Authority for Regulating the Telecommunications Sector (TRA) organized the first meeting of 2021 of the Online Service Index (OSI) Executive Team, an indicator of UAE Vision 2021 National Agenda. The meeting, held virtually, was attended by OSI team members representing 11 federal entities, including local electronic/digital governments. The meeting aims at reviewing best government practices for the year 2020, and international developments, especially with respect to the special circumstance that the world has gone through in recent months.
The meeting reviewed key achievements made by the UAE in Open Data, and the substantial development in the UAE Open Data Portal. The UAE advanced to the 16th place globally in the 2020 Open Data Inventory (ODIN) report, issued by the Open Data Organization, covering 187 countries, to record a jump of 51 ranks at once, compared to the 2018 report.
On this meeting, Salem Al Housani, Acting Deputy Director General of the Information and mGovernment Sector, and Chairman of the OSI Team, said: “At our first meeting this year, I find nothing better than to start with inspiration from the message of His Highness Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum, which he addressed to his people on the 15th anniversary of his Accession Day. The message was full of evidence that the UAE nation is indeed able to achieve and lead in various fields. We meet at the start of this year to affirm progress in cooperation between government and local entities to realize UAE’s visions and future goals.”
Mr. Al Housani stressed that the UAE was able to make strides in Open Data last year, reaching the 16th place globally. He added: “We will continue our meetings and joint cooperation to achieve all entitlements as today we are just a few months away to celebrating our golden jubilee, the deadline set by our wise leadership to realize UAE Vision and National Agenda Objectives. This requires further efforts from us as a national OSI team, and action to increase communication, coordination and cooperation between our government entities, in order to have an increased activation of smart services in line with UAE Vision 2021 and the goals of the National Agenda.”
During the meeting, participants reviewed the big leap made by the UAE in Open Data, according to the Open Data Watch, which measures the inclusiveness and openness of official data and statistics. It also includes an assessment of UAE Open Data Portals across 3 key sectors, 22 categories and 65 sub-indicators.
Furthermore, the meeting addressed the Open Data Race, one of the open data team initiatives in cooperation with 14 government entities, which contributed to raising UAE's ranking to 16th in the Global Open Data Index. The meeting reviewed the achievements of UAE Hackathon in its previous sessions.
Priorities of the National OSI Team are to provide a sustainable environment and an integrated digital infrastructure and to achieve the goals set at the global level. The Team acts in accordance with major global trends in the UN e-Government Survey, namely: bridging the digital divide, Open Data, promoting use, multichannel services, Connected Government (G2G), and e-participation.