MoW’s Information Technology Director Hisham Sater revealed that the Ministry has begun the implementation of the Green Information Technology Initiative, following the success in the application of the Green Building Technology. Sater explained that such strategic initiatives support the Green Information Technology Culture, which seeks to find sustainable solutions to reduce pollution and carbonic fingerprint; thus positively serving the environment related objective in Bahrain Economic Vision 2030, which takes into account public and health safety on the individual and group level and the public environment level.
This initiative aims to enhance staff awareness about their environmental role, create an environment friendly office culture through preserving nonrenewable resources such as papers and cartridge, save electricity power, recycling and other practices that contribute to the preserving the environment. The Information Technology Directorate transformed paper documents to electronic documents to reduce paper consumption, which was done through the activation of the EDMS at the offices of the top management, in addition to exchanging fax machines for an electronic fax and activating the communications system and electronic documents. The directorate has also activated the virtual desktops initiative by replacing 30% of PC servers with virtual desktops, thus reducing maintenance costs and saving energy.
Also, most of ITD’s systems have been installed on 110 virtual desktops and the automatic suspension system for computers has been implemented, also to save energy. In an attempt to change staff behavioral habits, awareness campaigns were held, all of which contribute to creating an efficient, sustainable and responsible environment. Other practices will also be applied in the future; reflecting the Ministry’s keenness to preserve environment, increase green spaces and reduce pollution resulting from the use of resources and electronic equipment, which increase carbonic emissions and global warming.
