Gov’t to establish innovation hub to explore innovative methods in technology

President Dr. Mohamed Muizzu has decided to establish an innovation hub to explore and research various innovative methods in the technology industry.

According to the President's Office, during the Cabinet meeting held on Sunday at the President's Office, the Cabinet decided to launch efforts to strengthen the government's technology sector to increase the contribution of the Information and Communication Technology (ICT) sector to the Maldives' productivity index, provide digital economic benefits to Maldivians, and achieve the results of efforts to digitalize the Maldives at a faster pace, bringing a revolutionary change to the ICT sector.

The work decided to be carried out includes establishing an innovation hub to explore and research various innovative methods in the technology industry, introducing modern laws and completing the legal framework needed to expedite national-level projects for digitalizing the Maldives, establishing a governance structure conducive to building an economy in the ICT sector, establishing an "interoperable open data sharing platform" for easy sharing of data and information between government agencies, and establishing central registers and registries used as the basic "single source of truth" to facilitate this and designating the state institutions responsible for maintaining these registers or registries, developing and publicizing centrally operated platforms at the national level to provide citizen-centric services and strengthen the e-government system, digitalizing services provided to citizens by all state institutions and government-owned companies to expand and strengthen the e-government system, establishing a National Sovereign Cloud for secure management of information and data collected by state institutions, expanding data center resources and strengthening the digital archiving system.

In addition to this, it was decided to develop e-Pass as an electronic identification system in accordance with international standards and introduce digital signatures, increase technology-related content in educational curricula to build a digitally literate workforce, train the workforce in new technology fields, develop research in this field, establish a special fund to promote innovative work and provide opportunities to expand training and research activities, and implement a "local first" policy or give priority to Maldivians in procuring ICT and other technology services for government needs.

The President's Office stated that during the Cabinet meeting, a roadmap was set for implementing these measures, and discussions were held on how to achieve various objectives.