Mada Center's National e-Accessibility Programme — Qatar's Government Websites Reach a 92% Accessibility Score

Mada -- the Assistive Technology Center Qatar -- was established in 2010 as a public-private partnership between ICTQatar, Qatar's two main telecom operators, Microsoft and Qatar National Bank, to close the country's digital-inclusion gap for people with disabilities and the elderly. In 2011 the Ministry of Communications and Information Technology issued Qatar's National e-Accessibility Policy, one of the first policies of its kind in the Middle East, covering websites, telecom services, handsets, ATMs and government e-services.
Rather than leaving compliance to individual ministries, Mada ran direct consultations, audits and training with government entities. Starting with more than 35 entities in 2016, the programme had expanded to 42 government entities by 2019, and the average government-website e-accessibility score rose to 92% that year, up from a much lower starting point when the programme began.
Independent validation followed: in the second edition of the UN G3ict Digital Accessibility Rights Evaluation (DARE) Index, released in 2020 and covering 137 countries, Qatar ranked first worldwide. Mada continues to run the country's accessibility certification scheme -- government sites such as the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the Ministry of Interior and the Ministry of Social Development have each received Mada's 'Access Certified' accreditation -- and is now recognised regionally as a centre of excellence in Arabic digital accessibility.

Read the full analysis: https://mada.org.qa/