Mada Center receives membership of World Wide Web Consortium

Mada Center has received the membership of World Wide Web Consortium planning and consulting committee (W3C) as the only Middle Eastern organisation to localise and adapt digital access and assistive technology solutions to the needs of Arab people with disabilities and is now a key member of the W3C advisory committee.The membership was received as Mada wrapped up its participation in committee’s meetings W3C that primarily specialises in programmes and websites and that is responsible for setting up guidelines, standards and regulations on which websites are designed.Mada Center, being a centre of excellence in digital access in Arabic, and for its ongoing work to understand and meet the needs of people with functional limitations professionally, was represented by the Digital Access Team at technical meetings on the issuance of standards and rules for accessible digital content.Commenting on the occasion, Mada Center CEO Maha al-Mansouri expressed pride in the fact that the centre is the only Arab institution to have achieved full membership in the association, as a result of the tireless efforts made by Mada Center to make browsing the web and digital content of digital platforms an ideal experience for people with functional limitations in Qatar and the Arab world.“The centre’s presence in the association is a confirmation of its status as a pioneer in supporting digital and communication accessibility and adapt it to the requirements of people with functional limitations, disabilities and the elderly, and renewing our commitment to raise awareness of the importance of the concept of universal and accessible design, as it urges us to discover more solutions to localisation and Arabisation of Innovations and standards that reduce the gap between people with disabilities and digital content on different platforms, in implementation of Qatar’s digital and web accessibility policy and the UN Convention on Persons with Disabilities,” she added.At the national level, Mada Center has achieved a digital accessibility rate of 94% amongst government websites, while Qatar ranks fifth globally on the Digital Accessibility Rights Evaluation Index (DARE).Mada Center is a private institution for public benefit, which was founded in 2010 as an initiative that aims at promoting digital inclusion and building a technology-based community that meets the needs of persons with functional limitations (PFLs), persons with disabilities (PWDs) and the elderly in Qatar. Today, Mada is the world’s Center of Excellence in digital access in Arabic. Through strategic partnerships, the centre works to enable the education, culture and community sectors through ICT to achieve an inclusive community and educational system. The Center achieves its goals by building partners’ capabilities and supporting the development and accreditation of digital platforms in accordance with international standards of digital access. Mada raises awareness, provides consulting services and increases the number of assistive technology solutions in Arabic through the Mada Innovation Program to enable equal opportunities for PWDs and the elderly in the digital community. (QNA)