Arabnet Arabnet

The Public Establishment for Industrial Estates – Madayn, represented by the National Business Centre, in cooperation with US-based CTEK Foundation, is all set to organise the first MENA Women’s Congress in the Sultanate of Oman to focus on empowering women through coding capabilities during the period from 14th to 16th October, 2019 at the Kempinski Hotel, Muscat.  

Sponsored by Petroleum Development Oman (PDO), the MENA Women’s Congress in Oman comes under the initiative of the CTEK foundation. The initiative aims at supporting women in the region by crafting programmes that give women opportunities to learn coding as a business through online learning, digital bonding and forming a community through women-only business incubators. 

Commenting on the significance of this event, Hilal bin Hamad Al Hasani, CEO of Madayn, says, “This event is derived from one of Madayn’s key cornerstones, which is to support entrepreneurship through our incubator programmes such as the National Business Centre, Industrial Innovation Centre, as well as funding innovative startups. It is essential to build up and enhance capabilities of the fourth industrial revolution. In fact, these efforts reflect part of Madayn’s major objectives to develop talent and create jobs of the future within its industrial cities.”

On his part, Raoul Restucci, Managing Director of Petroleum Development Oman (PDO), states that “PDO is committed to support programmes that develop the nation and this specific programme introduces and provides talented Omani women with a platform to more effectively compete at a regional and global level and create their own businesses.”

It should be noted that prior to the congress, a pilot website coding programme will be launched in Oman for a number of Omani females from different governorates during the period from October 8^thto 13^thOctober, 2019. The programme aims at teaching women not only how to code to get a job, but how to form an online business to create jobs for more women like themselves, and empower them with the skills to earn income from their own businesses. The congress will then discuss the outcomes of the pilot coding programme and explore ways to continue enhancing coding capabilities among women in the Sultanate.