The General Authority for Islamic Affairs and Endowments will showcase its latest digital initiatives, characterized by proactivity, innovation and leveraging the latest Fourth Industrial Revolution technologies such as Artificial Intelligence, Hologram, Internet of Things and others, during its participation in the GITEX Technology Week 2022. The goal was to provide services that keep up with stakeholders’ expectations and enhance the digital life quality of individuals and society. On this occasion, Dr Mohamed Matar al-Kaabi, Chairman of Awqaf, emphasised Awqaf’s keen interest in boosting excellence and development in all sectors, hoping to keep pace with the UAE’s vision leadership vision and the government’s strategy. Dr al-Kaabi hailed the unwavering support granted by HH Sheikh Mohammed bin Zayed Al Nahyan, UAE President, HH Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum, UAE Vice-President, Prime Minister and Ruler of Dubai, and Their Highness the Rulers of the Emirates. He said that such unstinting support had contributed significantly to Awqaf’s endeavour to keep abreast of the present-day changes and digital transformation and benefit from artificial intelligence to deliver its mission to a larger segment of society. One of the new projects that Awqaf is expected to present this year is the initiative to provide its services via (Amazon Alexa) devices, which have been linked to Awqaf’s services and the virtual assistant (Amazon Alexa), which is characterized by its ability to interact with voice, play audio, and make task lists using artificial intelligence technology. Users can ask Alexa questions about the services offered by Awqaf and some services, such as requesting to listen to Friday sermons, setting prayer times, listening to the morning and evening Adkar (remembrances of Allah), notifications and FAQs. An experience will also be presented for the use of Internet of Things technologies to monitor and follow up on Awqaf’s services provided to the public at external sites and the ease of obtaining and analyzing data to ensure the continuity of services, which enhances reducing energy consumption and reducing waste of resources. These services include controlling donation communications and containers by installing sensors to collect data to identify the status of communications and containers (ratio of fullness, as well as the status of forts in the event of any damage), then analyzing and studying the data to take the appropriate action and sending alerts automatically to the discharge teams and maintaining and providing an integrated data dashboard to connect all devices with a unified system to help extract real-time reports to decision makers. One of the modern initiatives to be launched by Awqaf will be preaching lessons across the UAE using hologram technology (virtual preacher), which is a 3D interactive picture of the natural size of the preacher broadcast at multiple locations to provide preaching lessons to an unlimited number of distant audiences, interacting with the public, and communicating directly with the preacher during broadcasting, where the preacher will give lessons from his website, for instance in Abu Dhabi, for the audience throughout the Emirates. The Awqaf’s participation at GITEX Technology Week 2022 is a continuation of the successes it achieved during the past exhibitions showcasing the latest technologies and innovations in the digital transformation and use of advanced technology based on artificial intelligence, in line with the UAE government vision and the Emirates Centennial 2071 and the UAE National Strategy for Artificial Intelligence 2031.

Source: General Authority of Endowments and Islamic affairs