Her Excellency Dr Aisha bint Butti Bin Bishr, Director General, Smart Dubai, thanked His Highness Sheikh Hamdan bin Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum, Crown Prince of Dubai, Chairman of The Executive Council of Dubai, on behalf of the Smart Dubai team for launching the ‘Thank You Heroes’ initiative.
H.E. Bin Bishr said that everyone at the Smart Dubai office received H.H. Sheikh Hamdan’s message, taking it as a directive for them to multiply their efforts to address the COVID-19 crisis and better serve the community, in line with Smart Dubai’s mandate to establish the emirate as the world’s happiest and smartest city.
“The hard work, dedication, and collaboration that professionals and workers acting as the UAE’s first line of defence against COVID-19 have exhibited throughout the crisis stem from the wise leadership’s strategy to always prioritise human beings, setting an example to all Dubai Government officials and employees to persevere and be closely involved in ensuring the wellbeing of the country and its citizens, residents and visitors” H.E. Dr Aisha added.
“The message of gratitude that H.H. Sheikh Hamdan bin Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum, Crown Prince of Dubai, Chairman of The Executive Council of Dubai, conveyed to our frontline heroes in all government and private sector entities in Dubai, acted as an inspiration for everyone to dedicate themselves to protecting Dubai’s inhabitants from the effects of the COVID-19 outbreak,” H.E. noted, reaffirming her confidence in the joint efforts these frontline heroes are undertaking in all sectors, which will “highlighted in history” for their effectiveness in combatting the global pandemic.
Since its establishment, Smart Dubai has developed innovative strategies to forecast the future and address its challenges under any circumstances. The entity’s proactive approach has helped establish a robust and sophisticated infrastructure that proved effective during the COVID-19 crisis, allowing the emirate to respond rapidly and continue to provide services under these difficult conditions.
Smart Dubai launched a bundle of projects and campaigns as the crisis worsened, in an effort to enhance the government’s digital capabilities and facilitate a seamless transition of the city’s key services to digital platforms. This, in turn, helped make people’s lives easier, providing them with easy access to smart services from the convenience of their homes, as the vast majority abided by precautionary stay-at-home measures.
A notable new service launched during the crisis was the Smart Dubai collaborated with the Dubai COVID-19 Command and Control Centre (CCC) to develop an innovative digital dashboard to monitor and predict the spread of the novel Coronavirus in Dubai and highlight efforts being made to combat it. The dashboard is part of the Centre’s continuous contributions to tackle the pandemic and develop solutions that enhance capabilities of relevant authorities in Dubai and the UAE to confine the virus, reduce infection rates, and boost recovery rates.
The dashboard is an important instrument for the CCC’s activities, and for crisis management in general. This initiative is in line with the Centre’s approach for dealing with the virus, which relies on epidemiology and data science helping leaders in decision-making.
In addition to that, Smart Dubai launched a campaign titled ‘Stay In, We’ve Got You Covered’, which sought to encourage individuals to use smart applications for conducting day-to-day transactions, stay safe in their homes, and take full advantage of the advanced digital infrastructure Smart Dubai provides. It promoted apps as DubaiNow, which provides access to more than 120 services from over 30 public and private sector entities in Dubai, including bill payments, DEWA, Etisalat and du, as well as vehicle services such as vehicle license renewal, paying fines, and paying for petrol. It also allows users to locate open pharmacies, as well as available doctors, clinics, and other health facilities.
Smart Dubai also sought to promote applications and softwares that are often used by Dubai Government employees and customers, and which helped play a tremendous role in ensuring the success of the remote work system. These include the Government Resource Planning Systems (GRPS) and the Smart Employee application, which act as a gateway to various functions such as human resources, purchasing, financing, and internal accounts for 52,000 Dubai Government employees. Smart Employee offers many services for Dubai Government employees and is implemented in more than 60 government entities.
The Smart Supplier app, meanwhile, allows registered suppliers to access data, contracts, tenders, and financial transactions at more than 16 government entities.
Moreover, Smart Dubai’s internal digital tools allowed it to continue operating seamlessly as the entity shifted to working remotely, where several programmes and digital technologies were employed to ensure business continuity and outstanding performance.
