About Shurkum

The Ministry of Technology and Communications (MTC) started the implementation of Shurkum initiative in 2014 to reinforce community eParticipation in the projects it carries out. The initiative aims to achieve interaction between MTC and the different segments of the society to take their opinion for more transparency and positive effective participation, thus improving the projects, initiatives and policies of MTC.

The project started with open discussion sessions through which MTC’s top management meets face-to-face with the different target groups of the community in order to take public’s opinions and suggestions. In addition, the event is broadcast live through MTC’s different social media channels. All suggestions and proposals are gathered to be presented to the management and based on which they take the appropriate decisions. Nine open discussion sessions were held so far.

Shurkum discussions:

MTC discussed several topics through Shurkum initiative to get public opinion on some of the projects and plans to engage the community in developing the services and laws and legislations related to ICT.

For more information about the previous sessions, click here.

Upcoming Shurkum Session

The role of Free and Open Source Software (FOSS) in Enhancing Entrepreneurship

Brief

Technology has become an essential element of life in a rapidly evolving world, which resulted in a growing need for digital services and solutions. Tech-culture is now an important area that must be taught to the current generation and the generations that follow to be able to keep up with the ongoing developments. As jobs are scarce and the number of job seekers is increasing nowadays, FOSS became an important resource in creating an environment that offers new opportunities. The importance of FOSS lies in it being a secure software due to the open nature of its code source and cost-saving as it is available for all. In addition, it has a broad fan base of developers who use it all around the world which makes its development faster as opposed to close source software.

A number of Omani startups were able to utilize FOSS successfully which enabled them to become leading businesses in their fields. One of the leading businesses that we hear about today is eMushrif which expanded to the regional market when it reached the Kuwaiti Market. There are also other startups like Mazaad which was established during the Oman Summer of Code Program organized annually by the ministry. There is also the Smart Developer Company which is incubated in Sas Center for Entrepreneurship.

Session objectives

• Introducing the importance of FOSS and its connection to 4-IR technologies

• Exploring ways to enable FOSS through listening to the audience’s recommendations

• Enhancing awareness on the ability to benefit from FOSS in entrepreneurship

• Highlighting the most prominent startups that benefited from FOSS

Session Topics

• First topic: The actual utilization of FOSS

  • FOSS’s influence on the economic, educational and entrepreneurship fields

• Second topic: Challenges hindering organizations/individuals to benefit from FOSS in Oman

  • The legal, legislative and educational aspects

  • Presenting a success story

•  Third Topic: Enablement, what do we need?

  • Training, capabilities and support

• Discussing the relation between FOSS and Open Data

  • How will the availability of open and updated data contribute to developing digital services and solutions using FOSS?

Target audience:

• Interested government entities

• Different members of society

• Private organizations interested in developing their businesses

Date  

Sunday, December 29, 2019

Time

10:30am – 12:30pm

Venue 

Sas Center for Mobile Apps Development, KOM.