The E-Commerce Council has announced that the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia has made a remarkable progress in the United Nations E-Commerce Index, issued by the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD). The Kingdom comes among the ten best countries, related to developing economies in the e-commerce index, as it advanced in the global ranking to achieve the 49th rank, so it is ahead of 3 ranks in 2019 index, compared to the previous year.
The report indicated that the improvement achieved by the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia resulted from two factors. First the proportion of using internet among individuals, which is witnessing a remarkable increase in the presence of a supportive digital background, which contributed to using internet widely among individuals to reach 93% in 2019, compared to 80% in 2018. This is due to the great efforts exerted by the Ministry of Communications and Information Technology in cooperation and integration with its partners in the Communications and Information Technology System.
The report was also based on the mail reliability standard, which enabled the liberalization of the mail and logistic services sector, making a remarkable progress in such sector. Therefore, the improvement rate reached 93%, compared to 80% as in the previous report last year. This indicator depends on four pillars of assessment: Reliability, Access, Linking, Flexibility.
His Excellency Dr. Majid bin Abdullah Al-Qasabi, Minister of Commerce and Investment, Chairman of the E-Commerce Council, affirmed that the advanced Kingdom's ranking in the e-commerce index, reflects the implementation of the E-Commerce Council’s initiatives, aiming at enhancing consumers' confidence in e-commerce, besides preserving and guaranteeing their rights, also contributing to creating an attractive and stimulating environment for investors and developing and strengthening the e-commerce system to keep pace with the global developments, so that to achieve the goals of the National Transformation Program, leading to the realization of the Kingdom's Vision 2030.
For his part, His Excellency the Chairman of the Saudi Post Corporation, member of the E-Commerce Council, Engr. Anif bin Ahmed Abanmi, expressed his happiness with the progress achieved in the United Nations E-Commerce Index, indicating that the Saudi Post Corporation participated in this success through its progress in five ranks in the integrated index 2019, for the development of postal services within the member states of the Global Postal Union (2IPD), achieving the 68th rank globally and 5th rank in the Arab world, compared to 73rd rank in 2018. This has a remarkable impact on the Kingdom's progress in the United Nations E-Commerce Index.
His Excellency stressed that this is the result of a team work that bears the vision of change and development. All focus was concentrated on raising the performance level of the Saudi Post, depending on a set of hubs including (the performance level of postal services, improving the customer's experience and providing services to customers from all over the world, in addition to diversification of revenue sources through innovative services that go in line with the market requirements.
For his part, His Excellency the Undersecretary of the Ministry of Communications and Information Technology for the Development of Technology and Digital Capacity, member of the E-Commerce Council, Dr. Ahmed Al-Thunayan, expressed his happiness with the significant and remarkable progress achieved by the Kingdom in the United Nations Index for E-Commerce, indicating that the Communications and Information Technology System works closely with the E-Commerce Council to develop the e-commerce sector.
H.E. added that the Communication & Information Technology System is endeavoring to achieve all initiatives and tasks with the help of a supportive digital background. This resulted in the spread of using internet widely, with a progress reaching 93%, indicating that the progress in this field was reflected on the progress of the global index. H.E. confirmed that this development, as mentioned in the global reports, will contribute to enhancing the reliability of e-commerce, and hence the growth of the e-commerce sector. Thus increasing its contribution in GDP.
It is worth mentioning that the E-Commerce Council, which was approved by the Council of Ministers, was established with the membership of 13 government agencies and 3 representatives from the private sector, with the aim of uniting efforts and focusing on a number of areas, including logistic services and digital payments. In addition to facilitating e-commerce business, enhancing the reliability of its transactions, preserving consumers' rights and keeping abreast of the developments in the global e-commerce market.
The E-Commerce Council works and follow up the implementation of a number of initiatives that contribute to developing the infrastructure of e-commerce, besides supporting regulations and legislation related thereto, also enabling payment systems, postal and logistic services, stimulating creativity in a number of fields, and providing a package of services to enable small & medium enterprises to enter this activity.