ADSIC Secures GPC to Spearhead the NOC Program

Creating an electronic gateway to bring efficiency to the currently complex process of issuing a ‘No Objection Certificate’ in Abu Dhabi.

The rapid pace of urban development in Abu Dhabi fuels thousands of projects related to construction permits and urban planning approvals. These result in approximately 100,000 No-Objection-Certificate (NOC) transactions being triggered every year by public, private and government entities, with each having to endure the processing complexities of the system. The GPC Group has partnered with ADSIC to address this processing challenge with strategic planning and implementation consultancy. By combining local expertise with global best practice, GPC will be helping to create a program that can be adopted widespread, that provides the private sector with immense efficiency gains, and that incorporates learning from international benchmark projects. 

“For contractors, developers and many private sector companies, NOCs pose a daunting challenge to business and can often cause significant loss in revenue. This translates into a very large negative impact on the economy in general” says Joseph Abdo, Director of Business Operations at the GPC Group. “With the NOC Program, we aim to make the NOC process painless and efficient. We have already gained support of core stakeholder entities and have a strong team in place to tackle this challenge”.  The NOC solution is designed to provide a single-window electronic gateway through which customers will be able to apply for, and track NOCs effectively from anywhere and at any time. This will be conducive to creating better working environments, improving efficiency, time, and cost, as well as having positive implications on protecting existing utilities and infrastructure, ensuring public safety, sustaining the environment and preserving cultural heritage.

ADSIC has been entrusted by Abu Dhabi Government to work in collaboration with the municipalities and other government stakeholder entities to design a comprehensive NOC solution for the Emirate of Abu Dhabi. The modernization of the NOC process is critical to an efficient and effective utilities and infrastructure service, and once implemented, it can be used to replicate efficiency in similar areas of service. 

GPC helps to ‘Re-Address’ the Emirate of Abu Dhabi

A new street addressing and signage system for the Emirate is to transform Abu Dhabi infrastructure and society as we know it. 

©Nicolas Mamberti

The Department of Municipal Affairs (DMA), under the direction of the General Secretariat for the Executive Council (GSEC), and in partnership with Abu Dhabi, Al Ain and Western Region Municipalities, is undertaking the recently initiated Abu Dhabi Emirate Street Addressing, GeoNames and Signage System (ADAGS) project. Bayanat, a wholly-owned Mubadala company born from the commercialisation of the UAE Armed Forces Military Survey Department, was on the 1^st April awarded the contract to lead the planning and implementation of this comprehensive Emirate-wide project.

The ADAGS project is expected to vastly improve how businesses and residences are referenced and located in ways that will provide benefits across most segments of Abu Dhabi society. Improving ambulance response time, reducing carbon footprint, effectively being able to monitor disease epidemics, and enabling economic growth through the online consumer are but a few examples of the possible impact an improved addressing system can have. The potential for change will transform the Emirate’s infrastructure and society as we know it. The ADAGS project will provide a sophisticated addressing system in-keeping with the progressive developments in Abu Dhabi, and the world platform. 

The diverse technical elements within the ADAGS project necessitate Bayanat to partner with several international experts. GPC is part of the management team responsible for project management, outreach, requirements assessment and program design, working in collaboration with ESRI Global, and four other subject matter experts: RoadPro (Australia), Merje (USA), Spatial Focus (USA), and Geo-Naming Solutions (Australia). 

The full project is scoped to span three and a half years.  A pilot effort has been initiated in coordination with Abu Dhabi Municipality to test basic standards and guidelines for four areas of the Capital.  The full implementation of new addresses and signs on the ground is expected to commence in 2014.

GeoVillage Jamaica Treads Pioneering Territory

GPC-ICT4D Jamaica alliance progresses ICT infrastructure developments for vulnerable communities to self-manage natural disasters.

JAMAICA - GPC’s GeoVillage platform is intended to bring foundation telecommunications and electrification to remote villages that don’t have such infrastructure, and to build on this with a wide variety of internet-based services that can tie villagers to a global network of useful services ranging from banking, microfinance, telemedicine, agricultural extension, and others.  GeoVillage is currently a conceptual framework developed by the GPC Group, and steps are underway in several countries around the world to turn this concept into reality.

As part of the GeoVillage development effort, the GPC Group has teamed with several important and influential partners in Jamaica to respond to a USAID Development Innovation Ventures (DIV) programme that specifically focuses on disaster management. Using GeoVillage as a foundation, this programme would empower poor and vulnerable communities to accurately prepare and respond to natural and climate-change related disasters with the use of state-of-the-art information and communication technology (ICT), geographic information systems (GIS) and significant participation by themselves. ICT4D (Information and Communications Technologies for Development) Jamaica’s technological and grassroots contribution has been instrumental in taking the project to new heights.     

“ICT4D’s remarkable team motivation and tenacity to progress the ICT infrastructure has now placed attention on all in-country partners to step-up action” said Mark Sorensen, GPC President. Responsibility is now on the broader consortium of committed program partners to seek concept and implementation funding from a variety of institutional, government and private sources. Initial funding for the project is being sought from the United State Agency for International Development (USAID) with a letter of interest recently submitted to the USAID-DIV (Development Innovation Ventures) – Humanitarian Innovation Initiative.        

At present, the Universal Service Fund (USF) Jamaica has a successful network of 118 Community Access Points (CAP) established across the Country, providing broadband internet service particularly to the rural and urban poor areas. GeoVillage would integrate its early warning systems for disaster management into this embedded network, adding efficiency to current regional resources. The proposed USAID-DIV project will select six CAP sites in highly vulnerable urban and rural communities across various Parishes in Jamaica with the potential of directly reaching 5,000 residents and 35,000 residents indirectly. It is expected that within 3 years, the GeoVillage programme could reach 50% of Jamaica’s population either directly or indirectly and 100% in 5 years.  

This collaboration of effort has received the strong endorsed and cost-share support from the USF Jamaica-CAP programme, and is further endorsed with financial support to up-scale the project by the Jamaica Ministry of Science, Technology, Energy and Mining, National Spatial Data Management Division within the Ministry of Water, Land and Environment and Climate Change, the Land Information Council of Jamaica, the Office of Disaster Preparedness and Emergency Management (ODPEM), Best Communities Jamaica, and the public-private volunteer network of the Jamaica National Emergency Response GIS Team (NERGIST).

Further details can be found in the GeoVillage Brochure, which is available in English, Arabic, Spanish and Portuguese, with Dari and Pashto available soon. Please contact contact@geovillage.org.