Overview

Over the past decade, the GCC countries have made great strides in digital transformation. One of the main reasons behind their success is the close cooperation between these countries at all levels. They have succeeded in providing advanced government services to the public, and they exerted great efforts in adopting modern technology and catching up with the latest trends in the age of 4IR. The UAE plays a pivotal role in promoting the progress in the Gulf region towards digital transformation, taking precedence over this, as it was the first eGovernment at the regional level to be established in 2001.

In 2013, H. H. Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid, Vice President and Prime Minister of the UAE and Ruler of Dubai launched the Smart Government Initiative. The primary aim of this initiative is to ensure the happiness of all UAE citizens. Sheikh Mohammed describes Smart Government as one that never sleeps (working 24 hours, 365 days a year), is as welcoming as a hotel, provides fast delivery and strong procedures, is innovative and adaptive, serves the citizens at any time and everywhere inside and outside the country, improves lives and responds to expectations.

With its regional commitments to the Sustainable Development Goals and WSIS Action Lines, the UAE also committed to support regional governments to achieve digital transformation.

What the UAE seeks to achieve is to make the government services reach to the level of excellence so that these services become a factor of happiness and sustainable development. It believes that this can be achieved through collective action at the regional and global levels, away from the siloed culture.

In this context, the UAE hosted several meetings and workshops of the International Telecommunication Union (ITU) as well as other global events related to the ICT. The UAE also hosted and chaired several international events related to the ICT sector. One of the latest and most relevant events in this regard was the Regional eGovernment Experts Workshop 2019 (ReGE19).

Co-operation with OECD

The UAE regularly partners with the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) to organise the annual meeting of the MENA-OECD Working Group on open and innovative government, with the shared objective of developing and leading inclusive digital maturity. As part of the MENA-OECD Governance Programme, this collaboration supports peer-to-peer exchange among OECD Member countries and their partners in the MENA region, with the aim of transforming governance for future-ready, citizen-centred, innovative and digitally enabled governments.

The last such meeting was held in April 2025 under the theme, ‘Shaping the Future Together: Digital Transformation and Innovation to Enhance Engagement and Digital Services in the MENA Region’ at TDRA Dubai Office. The purpose of that meeting was to continue building on previous discussions of the MENA-OECD Working Group on Open and Innovative Government, concentrating on the synergies that governments can identify in being more open, digital and innovative, and how this approach can contribute to promoting greater citizen and stakeholder participation in the MENA region.

The meeting was held over two days and saw the participation of distinguished government officials from Egypt, Italy, Jordan, Kuwait, Lebanon, Morocco, Mauritania, Palestine, Tunisia, Saudi Arabia, the UK and Yemen; with speakers from the governments of Italy, Jordan, Saudi Arabia, Morocco, Spain and the UK.

The second day was a workshop which featured presentations of pioneering international experiences in digital inclusion and community engagement. Decision-makers and experts discussed ways to enhance digital transformation in governments that would enable them to deliver more inclusive, innovative and responsive public services. The TDRA presented its approach to service design and delivery, highlighting the key challenges and opportunities in the area of digital government transformation.

The OECD, in turn, presented its approach to delivering integrated and inclusive public services, showcasing the OECD Digital Government Policy Framework along with key tools and recommendations that support inclusivity and improve user experience. It also shared its approach to engage and innovate with citizens for more accessible and inclusive public services. 

The agenda also featured a panel on leveraging technology for effective governance and accountability in the MENA region, as well as discussions on building an enabling environment for trustworthy AI in public services. 

The workshop concluded with an interactive session that introduced models and mechanisms for testing and developing digital services. Participants applied these models to selected government services in collaboration with representatives from federal entities, aiming to assess inclusivity and accessibility across all stages of the user journey. Practical and implementable solutions were proposed to address service delivery challenges and improve accessibility for all.

Through this workshop, the UAE reaffirms its commitment to fostering a constructive dialogue that supports comprehensive digital transformation across the region. It also aims to enhance knowledge-exchange and share successful experiences between countries, helping establish innovative government models capable of effectively responding to the aspirations of digital-era communities.

The Government Experience Exchange Programme

The Government Experience Exchange Programme is a platform established by the UAE to share its expertise and best practices in government development and modernisation with countries worldwide. The programme aims to facilitate knowledge sharing, and help participating countries stay abreast with global trends and seize development opportunities.

The UAE engages in experience exchanges with various countries across several streams, including the following areas:

• Government services - The UAE Government’s initiatives in government services are represented through two main pillars: The Capacity Building Programme and the Government Mobile Application Award. 

   

• Government excellence - This stream focuses on spreading a culture of quality and excellence among the representatives of government entities and developing an excellence model tailored to the partner country.

   

• Government accelerators - Serving as a platform to address challenges and achieve ambitious goals over short periods, this stream emphasises accelerated results, increased collaboration and innovation, and promoting integration between the public and private sectors.

   

• Government performance - This stream establishes a government performance framework that enables participating countries to enrich their performance management experience, review, and develop and refine their national plan to achieve their vision.

   

• Government innovation - It aims to stimulate and enrich the culture of innovation within the government sector through the development of an integrated innovation framework.

   

• Competiveness and statistics - This stream focuses on sharing the UAE’s experience in managing and monitoring global competitiveness reports and its best practices in global competitiveness. Federal Competitiveness and Statistics Centre plays a significant role in enhancing the country's global reputation and improving performance in the areas of global competitiveness, statistics and data.

   

• Leadership and capacity building - This stream aims to create change agents within the government, empowering them to engage, lead, innovate and contribute to their nation’s success.

   

• Government human resources - This stream focuses on setting HR systems, policies and legislations to manage the human capital effectively in the government sector. 

   

• Programming – The One Million Arab Coders initiative aims to empower the Arab youth with the language of the future, preparing the next generation of technology experts and creating new job opportunities in the region. The initiative has established successful partnerships with different governments.

   

• Startups and entrepreneurship - Area 2071 in the UAE offers an innovation ecosystem that brings together talented people, government officials, private sector cadres and other great minds to collaborate in designing and testing innovative solutions.

Since the launch of the programme, the UAE Government has entered into agreements with several countries to build institutional capacities for government development. The participating countries include:

• Egypt
• Serbia
• Uzbekistan
• Rwanda
• Seychelles
• Jordan
• Senegal
• Greece
• Guyana
• Colombia
• Iraq
• Costa Rica
• Sudan
• Kyrgyzstan
• Spain
• Maldives
• Barbados
• Central African Republic
• Paraguay
• Georgia
• Albania
• Malta
• Kurdistan region of Iraq
• Kazakhastan
• Turkmenistan
• Romania
• Zimbabwe
• Azerbaijan.

Read more information about the Government Experience Exchange Programme.

Watch related videos on the programme’s YouTube channel .

Related links:

• UAE launches government experience exchange programme to share advanced model with Africa - WAM
• The governments of the UAE and Spain exchange successful experiences in government work model – Ministry of Cabinet Affairs.

Hosting ReGE19

In light of its leading role at the regional level regarding eGovernment development, the UAE, in cooperation with other GCC states, hosted the Regional eGovernment Experts Workshop 2019 (ReGE19) to discuss the challenges faced by the stakeholders within the eGovernment Survey. The UAE's Telecommunications and Digital Government Regulatory Authority (TDRA) took the initiative to gather experts in order to explore the challenges under one roof and share its outcome with the rest of the world. As a result, the framework of the Regional eGovernment Experts Workshop 2019 (ReGE19) was designed to bring key international experts together in order to explore issues and challenges concerning the eGovernment development, learn from the best practices and share knowledge.

Purpose of the ReGE19

With eGovernment being at the core of building a strategic sustainable development framework, the focus of ReGE19 was to identify ways of improving the eGovernment development indicators and effectively utilise them in the future in cooperation with all member states. The key objectives of the workshop included:

1. Exploring issues, new opportunities, and challenges related to the eGovernment development indicators
2. Learning from the best practices and experiences
3. Sharing knowledge from experts in the eGovernment and ICT field
4. Ensuring that countries are using the UN indices to advance and enhance their service delivery and ensure that no one is left behind
5. Using such indices in their development strategy at a national level and embrace them in their Key Performance Indicators (KPI).

Arabic UN e-Government Survey

In cooperation with the United Nations, the UAE’s Telecommunications and Digital Government Regulatory Authority (TRA) launched the Arabic version of the UN e-Government Survey Report. The objective of launching the Arabic version is to share the knowledge with the Arab countries, especially those who are working in the Government domain. 

The survey shall give all Arab governments an opportunity to become familiar with global attempts, advanced practices and reports in the field of digital transformation and the standards required to enable them to progress towards such transformation.

ITU events

The UAE hosted and chaired several international events related to the ICT sector emphasising its position at the regional and international level.

Regional cooperation

Egypt

In February 2018, the UAE signed a Memorandum of Cooperation with the Egyptian Government to exchange experiences to develop the government services. The agreement aims mainly at the development of the smart services of the Egyptian government, benefiting from the great progress of the UAE government in this field.

With the support and participation of the Government of the UAE, Egypt hosted the Egypt Government Excellence Conference 2018. The UAE's effective contribution to the event demonstrated its government's keenness to forge a strong strategic government partnership and cooperation across various fields.

Jordan

June 2018 saw the signing of a Memorandum of Understanding with Jordan for the development of the government apparatus’ performance and improve its services, with special focus on smart services.

The agreement recognised the importance of developing government services to benefit citizens and service recipients, as well as strengthening institutional capacity and mutual benefit in the development of government work.

Related links

• United Nation eGovernment Survey Regional eGovernment Experts Workshop – World Government Summit
• Success story in achieving quantum leap in government services – WAM
• UAE’S Candidacy For Re-Election To ITU Council 2019-2022 (PDF, 500 KB) – TDRA