Interview by Mohammad Al-Mutairi KUWAIT, Dec 21 (KUNA) -- Director General of the Arab Planning Institute (API) Dr. Adel Al-Wugayan said that the Institute's vision for the next five years is mainly intended to bolster its position as a leading and credible know-how entity.
In an interview with KUNA on Sunday marking the launching of the AIP's 10th strategy 2025-2030, Al-Wugayan said the API seeks to advance development planning systems in Arab countries and promote cooperation with policymakers to back inclusive growth and sustainable development.
He elaborated that the fresh strategy focuses on a set of prime principles that mark a framework of the AIP's directives that ensure harmony between planned goals and the API's vision and message and address development challenges Arab countries are facing.
He added that the principles on which the blueprint is based are meant to set out clear-cut and measurable strategic goals, prioritize activities, provide financial, human and technical resources, and adopt accurate performance indicators to gauge progress.
The API's strategy is also built on a group of recommendations, mainly including the necessity of promoting and focusing the efforts of Arab capacity building in all relevant domains as well effectively partaking in academic and ideological dialogue regionally and internationally, he remarked.
It also includes advancing and drawing the best research and consulting capabilities and effectively participating in promoting policymaking at the Arab level and bolstering research distinction and disseminating developmental awareness, while ensuring the Institute's financial, regulatory and human sustainability in a bid to ensure its sustainable services.
Al-Wugayan underlined that the Institute attaches great importance to linking its training, consulting and research efforts to economic, financial, social and environmental development requirements within the framework of implementing the 10th strategy, while putting each member state's development landscape privacy into consideration.
The API's chief pointed out the Institute's commitment to designing its activities in a manner that suits the nature of its member states' economies of member countries with a view to strengthening Arab development paths and backing ways of addressing changing challenges and successive crises that most Arab countries are undergoing due to global environment volatility and mounting risks.
The plan considers investment in modern and digital technology in order to beef up the API's operational efficiency, and pays much attention to the institutional communication in an effort to boost the API's presence and influence in the developmental field and develop an Arab content that backs the achievement of the region's sustainable development goals, he noted.
Furthermore, the 2025-2026 training strategy mainly aims at establishing the API's leadership in the area of specialized development training and human capacity-building by means of advancing the quality of training programs and ensuring that they are offered with high efficiency with the goal of maximizing relevant benefits.
He expounded that the plan included a set of advanced training programs that keep abreast of development issues, adding modern topics such as artificial intelligence (AI), the green economy, the circular economy, and energy transition, He went on saying that the training programs included development planning, economic modeling, macroeconomic management, economic diversification, competitiveness, sustainable finance, human development, social empowerment, digital transformation, smart institutions, entrepreneurship, and support for small and medium-sized enterprises.
In the field of consulting services and institutional support, the API's chief stressed that his agency would carry on offering its services in this domain in a way that enhances its position as a prestigious Arab know-how entity, primarily in planning, development and development policies, based on drawing upon the latest scientific methods and quantitative models.
Al-Wugayan concluded by underlining the API's commitment to focusing on research pertinent to developmental planning, policies and performance in Arab countries and suggesting good developmental policies with a view to supporting Arab developmental decision-making.
Based in Kuwait, the Arab Planning Institute (API) is a non-profit regional organization whose primary goals and mission are to advance the cause of economic and social development in the Arab countries through training, research, consultancy, expert-group meetings and publication. (end) md.mt