UAE Cabinet Congratulates President, Arab and Muslim People on Holy Month of Ramadan

The UAE Cabinet, chaired by His Highness Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum, UAE Vice President, Prime Minister and Ruler of Dubai, has yesterday congratulated His Highness Sheikh Khalifa bin Zayed Al Nahyan, UAE President, Members of the Federal Supreme Council and Rulers of Emirates, the Emirati People and Arab and Muslim countries on the occasion of the holy month of Ramadan.

His Highness Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid said "Ramadan is an opportunity for us all to renew our energy, spread the spirit of tolerance and our traditions alike." His Highness Sheikh Mohammed added, "Ramadan is an occasion and opportunity for innovation in our life and adopt positive behaviour. It is an opportunity to review our life and dedicate more efforts for work."

The Cabinet has endorsed setting up the National Program for Small and Medium-Sized Enterprises. The Program, which will be under the umbrella of the Ministry of Economy, aims to develop blueprints to provide expertise, technical support as well as training to boost SMEs. It will also coordinate with federal and local governments and private sector to promote products inside the UAE and abroad as well as conduct periodic reviews of SMEs on challenges and proposed recommendations.

Meanwhile, the Cabinet also issued a decree to set up the Small-and-Medium-Sized Enterprises Council that will represent relevant government and private entities. The mandate of the Council will include draft policies and strategies on developing SMEs, set regulations that will coordinate the relationship of the National Program for Small and Medium-Sized Enterprises and relevant entities as well as follow up the performance of the Program. The Cabinet also reviewed mechanism to provide incentives to national SMEs in the UAE.

Boosting local and global competiveness of the SME in the UAE reflects government's efforts to ensure sustainable of economic development that will eventually contribute to the UAE's economy, which is based on knowledge and innovation. This comes in line with the National Agenda which seeks to ensure "SME's contribution to non-oil GDP reaching 70% by the year 2021."

On the other hand, the Cabinet discussed other topics on the agenda and endorsed implementing a national strategy to establish and support research-and-development centres on health-related issues. It aims at coordinating efforts with academia in the UAE to develop and publish scientific researches on health issues, identify and address health issues in the UAE community as well nurture an innovative environment to strike an effective partnership between public and private sectors and academia.

The strategy, which will be implemented between 2015 and 2017, seeks to boost the contribution of UAE globally in scientific researches on health issues, develop policies and legislations, and provide a nurturing environment to support studies.

The outputs of health-related researches centres will contribute in setting scientific research ethics in the country, encourage researchers, setup a unified system to register health-related publication. It will also contribute in building national capacity as well as provide a comprehensive database.

This national strategy on health-related research centres comes in line with the UAE Vision 2021 that reflects government's efforts to provide best-of-class health services.

Meanwhile, the Cabinet also approved an awareness-oriented initiative, which is an outcome of the government innovation lab. It aims to educate the public about healthy lifestyle and engage all members of the community and NGOs in health-related awareness programs. The initiative includes a number of measures to combat obesity and promote healthy lifestyle. It will include more than 20 awareness activities, supervised the Ministry of Health and a number of federal and local entities will take part in implementing the initiative within three years.

Pertaining to legislations, the Cabinet endorsed amending few items of the Federal Law No 16 of 2007 on animal protection as well as issuing a federal law on regulating owning animals.

Related to financial matters, the Cabinet approved the closing account of the Emirates Real Estate Cooperation. The Cabinet also endorsed extending the period of preparing federal entities mid-term budget from three to five years.

On the International level, the Cabinet endorsed a bilateral agreement on customs with Morocco, another with Albania on mutual visa waiver for diplomats. The cabinet also endorsed five agreements on economic and technical cooperation with Kosovo, Nicaragua, Cambodia, Singapore and Barbados. It also signed two agreements with Italian government on legal issues as well as two agreements with Chad and Guinea-Bissau on aviation services.

The UAE Cabinet held its meeting at the Presidential Palace and was attended by H.H. Lt. General Sheikh Saif bin Zayed Al Nahyan, Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of the Interior , H.H. Sheikh Mansour bin Zayed Al Nahyan, Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Presidential Affairs.