The Bahrain IT Expo 2014, a continuation of the three-day forum will be hosted by the Bahrain International Circuit. More than 20 recognised speakers and 700 internationally-renowned delegates attend the event.
The eGovernment excellence awards for 2014 were given away at the forum. The best eContent award for the year was won by the Ministry of Health. The Social Insurance Organisation won the award for best eService. The best eProject was awarded to National Authority for Qualifications and Quality Assurance of Education and Training (QQA). The Ministry of Interior – General Directorate of Traffic – won the best application for Smart devices. The eParticipation award was won by the Ministry of Culture and the eEconomy award was taken by the Ministry of Municipalities Affairs and Urban Planning.
In multi-sectors, Zain Bahrain won the best application for Smart devices, while Batelco won the eEconomy award. Amina Gallery won the eEntrepreneur award and the eNGO award was given to Youth Pioneer Society.
Mohammed Ahmed Qamber’s social media donations and Mohammed Abdulla Hasan’s ePearl Mobile App won the best eConcept Award. Sameera Abduljabbar Al Kooheji and Sayed Abdulghani Hamza Qarooni shared the eCitizen Award.
Mohammed Ali Al Qaed, the Chief Executive Officer, eGovernment Authority, told the Bahrain News Agency (BNA) on the sidelines that the 2014 forum structure is different from the previous ones. “Instead of a two-day forum and holding workshops we have a one-day forum with the keynote speakers talking about ICT trends for the decision makers,” he said.
For the remaining two-days, there are the full-day specialized workshops. This is in place of the four-hour workshops for two days as in the past. To educate the technical people how to balance the trends. The space and the workshop size have both tripled, the CEO said.
Looking at the challenges faced by the authority, he said it included coping with the higher, ambitious demand of the customer needs. “We had to get into complex applications and very complex integrations. Taking the payment portal as an example, the customer had to enter a single service portal of his choice and then enter the payment channels and, enter the data for making the payment. Now, the customer has to enter the user ID and password and all the services that the customer has used in the past are listed according to the pattern of use. This eliminates the need for entering data all the time. Finding the user’s choice and providing it in real time is the challenge,” said the CEO. The utilities and profile of the customers are monitored to make it easy.
To ensure that these applications and many more and protected all the time, a team of IT security professionals work round-the –clock and build security defense systems to thwart attempts, the CEO said.
“We now look at implementing the new portal and integrate it with the current services. We re-engineered the 24 services of the old portal to that of the new one. New services and strengths have been added,” he said. It is only re-engineering and not shifting the services to the new portal. This will take time because the services have gained more details. The services of the new portal will be made available to the people in 18 to 24 months, Al Qaed said.
“The three day event will ensure that the government and private sector in Bahrain stay competitive using the best technologies available to enhance their processes, output. This will help push Bahrain’s competitiveness to the fore,” the Minister for Transportation and Acting Head of the Bahrain Economic Development Board, Kamal Ahmed told the BNA on the sidelines of the forum.
Using the technologies in the sector, the transport sector has gained much and benefitted the masses, he added. While the aviation sector is highly-technology oriented, the land transport sector will also get a fillip, he added. A new digital system is being planned in Bahrain’s land transport that will benefit both the transport administration and the public, the minister said. All information on the arrival and departure of buses and where they are will be made available over the mobile phone, in December 2014.
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Quelle/Source: Bahrain News Agency, 21.04.2014
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