Al Mansouri opens computers refurbishing centre

Hussain Nasser Lootah, Acting Director General of Dubai Municipality, Jassim Darwish, Secretary General of the UAE Municipalities, Ibrahim Bumelha, Vice-Chairman of the Board of Trustees of the Mohammed Bin Rashid Charity Foundation, attended the ceremony held on Wednesday at he new centre in Al Qusais 3, close to the EPPCO Tasjeel Centre.

Al Mansouri said the project would be of benefit to many individuals and educational bodies in different parts of the world and would contribute in enhancing knowledge and support education.

He added that the ministry and the municipality have initiated this project to spread the culture of technology and protection of environment and also to help educational institutions.

The Global Information Summit held in Tunis in 2005 had initiated the project of collecting, refurbishing and distributing used computers and their accessories for the benefit of specific categories of people in the society, who are less fortunate to have the facility of computers. Al Mansouri added that UAE was among those who initiated the implementation of this recommendation with the approval of the UAE cabinet.

Stressing on the Municipality's keenness to take up the social responsibility, Lootah said the civic body has embarked on this initiative to fulfill its environmental, educational and charity objectives under the service perspective.
"Through this project we endeavour to support educational work and enhance the student culture, especially when these computers will support the new technical programmes that suit different stages of schooling," said Lootah.

He said the Municipality will cooperate with Mohammed Bin Rashid Al Maktoum Charity and Humanitarian Foundation in distributing the computers that will be refurbished with technical support from Microsoft.

Lootah said the Municipality since the launch of the project late last year has so far collected a total of 1289 computers, 1243 monitors and 90 printers that have been donated by corporate establishments and individuals. Major corporate donors include Union National Bank, Fairmont Hotel, National Bank of Dubai, Dubai Internet City, and Mohammed Bin Rashid Establishment for Supporting Youth Projects.

"We aim to collect around 5,000 computers a year and hope to make it 10,000 with more concerted efforts by different local and federal government bodies and the private establishments. With these computers and their accessories the Municipality will try to support developmental and educational projects and also spread electronic culture in the remote and rural areas in some under developed countries in the light of the existing cooperation and friendship with them," Lootah said.

He said a total budget of One Million Dirhams has been earmarked for this project during the current year.

The project is aimed at sharing technology by leveraging IT expertise to refurbish computers for use in learning. IT equipment will be refurbished under the project to prevent the waste of useful equipment, to support those on the learning and to protect the environment. Individuals who wish to donate used equipment including usable CPUs, monitors, scanners, printers and other computer accessories may contact the Municipality's centres in various parts of the emirate or call its Contact Centre on 800900 and the collected equipment will be refurbished by the Municipality's Information Technology Department with the help of Microsoft and then given to schools or eligible non-profit organizations.