The Abu Dhabi private sector receives massive boost from their government: nine new initiatives announced
The Abu Dhabi Government has decided to implement nine new initiatives to create a better business environment for the private sector.
All these initiatives came as part of Ghadan 21, Abu Dhabi’s accelerator program that aims at making business operations easier in the emirate.
The program is going to last for three years, starting from 2019. It includes a Dhs 50 billion funding that will be invested in four strategic pillars- economic, knowledge, livability and social,
According to Gulf Business, the target of the program is to create more than 10,000 Emirati jobs, support investment, ease business licensing and boost contract payments.
Let’s have a look at all of these new initiatives:
Instant licencing
With this initiative, all licence applications will be streamlined through an advanced digital portal and consolidated into broader licencing categories. It will remove a lot of inconvenient steps for the business to get their licence, making the whole procedure hassle free.
“Building a sustainable, globally-competitive knowledge-based economy requires a solid partnership between the private and public sector. The government of Abu Dhabi is fully committed to enabling the private sector by providing a supportive business environment, creating new public-private partnership opportunities and enhancing the ease of doing business,” said Saif Mohamed Al Hajeri, chairman of the Abu Dhabi Department of Economic Development (DED).
“The latest Ghadan 21 initiatives and Abu Dhabi instant license are vital private sector accelerators as they are focused on speed, flexibility, and simplicity – reducing operating costs, introducing new investment opportunities and establishing innovative licensing frameworks.”
“They are initiatives that will help drive forward our goal to increase the private sector’s contribution to Abu Dhabi’s GDP from the current 32 per cent to 37 per cent by 2021,” he added.
Industrial tariff
DED has decided to impose new industrial tariffs that are going to be determined by an established mechanism of scoring, based on: economic impact, productivity and electric load.
Technology business licences
DED is also going to introduce new licences for tech businesses, which will cover 13 new businesses activities in the industry.
SME credit card guarantee scheme
This initiative will make financing opportunities more accessible to SMEs from the region, via a guarantee provided by the government to banks. The scheme guarantees up to 75% of loan value that will be provided to the bank in cases of defaults. It will enable the banks to allow more funding to SMEs due to the security they are getting. The Abu Dhabi Investment Office (ADIO), the Department of Finance and First Abu Dhabi Bank have jointly launched this scheme.
The corporate R&D program
In order to find more investment opportunities, the ADIO has launched a dedicated corporate R&D program as well. The allotted Dhs 4 billion funding will be used to power the research and development activities of the companies supported by it.
Open data initiative
The open data initiative is a program that offers integrated technical system to facilitate data sharing and user access. This program is launched by the Abu Dhabi Digital Authority (ADDA), to assist research institutions by giving them access to public data. The institutions can use this data for conducting their researches to solve various problems.
TAMM journeys
ADDA will also provide updates on TAMM Journeys, a full-fledged portal that provides people with access to government services.
Sharaka platform
‘Sharaka’ means ‘partnership’ in Arabic, and this platform is built on the basis of that. Managed by the Abu Dhabi Council for Economic Development (ADCED), Sharaka will work as a communication mechanism based on concepts of constructive dialogue, transparency and responsiveness. It has introduced a new payment policy that allows state owned and government entities to provide 30-day payment terms to their contractors.
Ecotourism incentives
According to the WAM report, the ecotourism incentive will promote Mirfa, desert locations and private islands to foreign tourists. To make these tourism archetypes more attractive, ADIO and the Department of Culture and Tourism will offer land lease exemptions, accelerated licencing, tax waivers, marketing and government infrastructure investment.
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