Bahrain eContent Awards for 2009 officially launched

Registration of entries has now commenced for Bahraini individuals, civil society institutions and private sector companies, together with the State ministries and organizations.

Mr. Al-Hujairi invited all organizations and individuals involved in e-business to register their participation by visiting, a website specifically designed to receive the award applications.

The final deadline for entries is November 23, 2008.

Mr. Al-Hujairi said: "The decision to limit the participation to Bahraini individuals and institutions was taken in order to strengthen Bahrain's own e-content industry and to provide Bahrainis with the opportunity to enter the regional and international technology markets."

The awards will honour and promote the very best of the Kingdom's e-content in the following 10 categories: e-Government, e-Entertainment, e-Health, e-Learning, e-Science, e-Inclusion, e-Business, e-Culture, in addition to two new categories this year,e-Banking and e-Media added to acknowledge the growing importance of the two sectors in Bahrain.

The highlight of the awards is the nomination of the winners to the World Summit Awards.

Entries go through a two-stage process before the winners are announced: first being registration, followed by arbitration of participations that meet the registration requirements. The entries will finally be evaluated by the very highest International standards.

All eContent winners will be presented with awards at a special ceremony and the best in each category will then be selected to be nominated to represent the Kingdom of Bahrain in the World Summit Awards (WSA).

Mr. Isa Abdul Rahman, Deputy Chairman of the Organizing Committee and Director of Marketing and Awareness of the Bahrain eGovernment Authority, said: "The eContent awards are designed to focus on the quality of the content in terms of depth, diversity and inclusiveness. The winners will be adjudged on the basis of presentation, construction engineering, accessibility and accuracy of search results, including browsing and navigation mechanisms."

The organizing committee invites all stakeholders in e-business to participate in this competition, which would contribute towards developing the Kingdom of Bahrain to a more privileged centre in the e-content industry, through promotion and sponsorship of talented young Bahrainis.