UAE leads Mena in e-readiness ranking

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The UAE leads the Middle East and North Africa (Mena) region in the global e-readiness rankings published by the Economist Intelligence Unit, but the country dropped two spaces this year.

Notching a rank of 35 in a list of 70 compared to 33 last year, the UAE scores 6.09 out of a possible 10, compared to a score of 6.22 in 2007. This puts it ahead of countries such as Turkey (rank 43), Saudi Arabia (46), Jordan (53), Egypt (57), Algeria (67) and Iran (70). The United States has toppled Denmark to be at the top of the 2008 rankings.

E-readiness is a measure of the quality of a country's information and communications technology (ICT) infrastructure and the ability of its consumers, businesses and governments to use ICT to their benefit.

"When a country uses ICT to conduct more of its activities, its economy can become even more transparent and efficient. The e-readiness rankings also allow governments to gauge the success of their ICT strategies against those of other countries, and provide companies wishing to invest overseas with an overview of the world's most promising investment locations from the perspective of e-readiness," the EIU said in a briefing paper released recently.

"The rankings illuminate the factors that are driving, or inhibiting, countries' progress in using ICT to advance economic and social development," said Peter Korsten, Global Leader of the IBM Institute for Business Value.

"Whether the countries are, as IBM defines them, 'established leaders', 'rapid adopters' or 'late entrants', the public and private sectors should co-operate and work together to promote the most effective use of digital technology towards this objective," said Korsten.

The UAE is not the only nation that has moved lower in the rankings. Denmark has, after four consecutive years as the world's most e-ready country, fallen four places, as has Switzerland, to fifth and ninth places respectively. The US is now the global e-readiness leader, with a score of 8.95, followed by Hong Kong, which has advanced two places.

Finland has also dropped three places, from 10th to 13th, and has been supplanted in the top 10 by Austria.

"The decline in fortunes of the European ICT leaders is mainly a result of their failure to sustain, in selected areas, the heady pace of development they had previously established.

"Both Finland and Denmark, for instance, suffered significant drops in their consumer and business adoption scores as they were unable to maintain previous ICT spending levels or to improve upon public and corporate access to digital channels," the EIU said.

Similarly, Switzerland was judged to have lost some of the clarity of vision and commitment that had marked its e-government strategy.

By contrast, those countries that have advanced in the top 10 the US, Hong Kong, the Netherlands (seven) and Australia (which jumped five places to claim the fourth spot) have largely done so on the back of vast improvements in the expansion of connectivity, including in broadband accounts and WiFi hotspots, as well as in the security of internet connections.

Improved performance in the area of innovation has also contributed to these countries' moving up the e-readiness rankings.

Collectively, the world has moved up on the e-readiness charts. Average e-readiness rose to a score of 6.39 in the 2008 rankings, up from 6.24 in the previous year.

Categories for scoring criteria were as follows: 'connectivity and technology infrastructure' (with a weight of 20 per cent); 'business environment' (15 per cent); 'social and cultural environment' (15 per cent); 'legal environment' (10 per cent); 'government policy and vision' (15 per cent); and 'consumer and business adoption' (25 per cent).

By Yazad Darasha

© Emirates Business 24/7 2008