Khidmaty — Mauritania's Digital One-Stop Shop for Business Registration and Investment Certificates

Mauritania's Ministry of Digital Transformation, Innovation and Administrative Modernisation has been building a national digital-identity backbone since at least 2023, when President Mohamed Ould Cheikh El Ghazouani launched the "Houwiyeti" biometric digital-ID application. The underlying system — developed with biometrics vendor TECH5 and local integrator SmartMS, and funded through a UNDP-backed pilot that ran until October 2023 — issues each citizen a digitally signed, QR-coded electronic identity.

On 4 April 2025, the government used that identity layer to launch Khidmaty, an online platform (web and mobile) through which investors can complete two previously paper-bound procedures — business creation and Investment Certificate applications — authenticated via Houwiyeti. The rollout was led by the Ministry of Economy and Finance together with the state digital agency AN-ETAT, and was explicitly framed as opening business registration to the Mauritanian diaspora, who can now establish a company without travelling home.

The move follows a 2023 proposed Startup Act intended to give registered startups customs and tax incentives, positioning Mauritania alongside Senegal, Tunisia, Nigeria, Algeria and the DRC in adopting startup-specific legal frameworks.

No usage statistics — registrations processed, processing-time reductions, or diaspora uptake — have been published for Khidmaty; the evidence available is limited to the platform's launch, its technical architecture and its stated policy intent.

Read the full analysis: https://apim.gov.mr/mauritania-digitalizes-its-services-for-investors/