Abu Dhabi to double online revenues by end of the year

Abu Dhabi is looking at doubling its online revenues to more than Dh40 million by the end of this year as the UAE capital embarks on a more aggressive marketing campaign, a senior government official said.

The Abu Dhabi Government aims that 35 per cent of its commercial transactions would be made via online by 2012. Currently, only nine per cent of the transactions are done via e-services.

"Last year, we had 9,000 transactions representing six per cent of the total commercial transactions. Although it's only six per cent we were nevertheless able to make Dh20m as income, which goes to the government," Abdalrhman Saif Al Khader, Head of Online Services Section at the Abu Dhabi Department of Economic Development told Emirates Business on the sidelines of the 15th GCC eGovernment and eServices Forum.

He said the government is now looking at increasing the coverage to 14 per cent, which will in turn see more than Dh40m in revenues. Currently the coverage has risen to nine per cent from 6 per cent last year.

"The first two years are the most difficult, especially because most of the people are still not aware and some are hesitant to use credit cards via online transactions. But we will meet the 35 per cent target by 2012," Al Khader said.

He said Abu Dhabi is rebranding the Department of Planning and Security to Department of Economic Development and together with the aim of increasing awareness for online services, the government is increasing its marketing and advertising budget this year.

"Last year we had marketing budget of about Dh2m but this year it will be bigger," he said. "Before we were only using business centres to market our online services but now we also do workshops with investors to build trust."

Meanwhile, the UAE Ministry of Justice is pursuing an e-justice programme that aims to provide electronic services to ministry's staff, legal community and public.

The e-services portal is looking at offering electronic archival, electronic payment, electronic notary, case management, electronic filing, legal research, electronic drafting and publishing of legislation.

According to Dr Nabeel Al Qirim, associate professor of College of Information Technology, UAE University, governments worldwide have spent more than $3 trillion (Dh11trn) on IT excluding health, education and utility sectors.

However, 60 to 80 per cent of eGovernment projects have failed, while many of initiatives are still in the early stages. In the region, Al-Qirim said eGov transformation is slow. "With the exception of high performing nations, on average less than 50 per cent of all internet users access eGov data and less than 20 per cent undertake online transactions," he said.

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