RAS AL KHAIMAH: The Department of Economic Development in Ras Al Khaimah signed a Memorandum of Understanding with the Anti-Smoking International Alliance (London) yesterday. The MoU comes as an endeavor to encourage the community involvement and cooperation towards achieving common interests with the government, in addition to eliminating harmful behaviors in society such as smoking.
The agreement was signed by Dr. Abdulrahman Alshayeb Alnaqbi, General Director of RAK DED and Dr. Abdul Salam Al Madani, Chairman of the Anti-Smoking International Alliance- London. The MOU signing was also attended by Dr. Salah Al Deen Al Bloushi, Consultant at the Health Ministry of Oman and Dr. Hisham Safadi, Founder of UDENZ App in addition to a number of officials and representatives from both sides.
RAK DED is working diligently to maintain the social responsibility among business communities, as it had adopted a number of programs and initiatives that encourages social responsibility. The department also works hard to follow the vision of the wise leadership of the UAE which aims at creating an active social responsibility base and achieve sustainable development in the UAE.
The agreement that was signed today aims at conducting a number of initiatives and campaigns that consolidates good values and good citizenship among society, in addition to changing a number of popular bad habits that encourage smoking. Moreover, the initiative will strengthen the role of the Department of Economic Development in Ras Al Khaimah and its interaction with the community and will enhance its efforts to combat smoking and protect society from the diseases resulted by this negative behavior. The initiative will also help in stopping wasting large sums of money while treating diseases resulted from smoking.
From his side, Dr. Abdulrahman Alshayeb Alnaqbi, General Director of RAK DED extended his gratitude to the Anti-Smoking International Alliance for their cooperation with the economic department to eliminate this bad and unhealthy behavior in Ras Al Khaimah, he mentioned that RAK DED is keen to adopt this nonprofit initiative during the Year of Giving in addition to a number of other charitable initiatives that RAK DED launched this year.
Dr. Abdulrahman Alshayeb Alnaqbi also said: “we have adopted this initiative under the slogan (together we combat smoking for our generation and the coming generations). We aim to create a healthy business environment among corporates in Ras Al Khaimah, therefore, we have also placed the logo of the Anti-Smoking Alliance on all documents printed inside RAK DED. We are trying to spread this culture among business communities in the emirate in addition to launching a number of awareness campaigns that support this initiative.”
From his side, Dr. Abdul Salam Al Madani, Chairman of the Anti-Smoking International Alliance – London said: “we are very proud of this pioneer initiative launched by RAK DED and we also value all the efforts extended by the Department. This initiative is the first of its kind in the world that comes from a business entity, and it is a unique opportunity to spread awareness about the disadvantages of smoking across business community. On behalf of me and all members of the alliance, I extend my deepest gratitude for this trust coming from a national governmental entity, outside the health industry. This is a valid evidence on the efforts attained by the government of Ras Al Khaimah to spread awareness and support the coming generations while educating them about the risk of smoking.”
Dr. Al Madani also referred to this initiative as an excellent example of other organizations and associations which would encourage them to support this initiative for the overall benefit of the society. He also said: “we will grant free membership to all licenses issued by RAK DED in order to encourage them to continue in this endeavor and to help them commit to a healthy behavior for a better and successful working environment.”
From his side, Dr. Hisham Safadi, Founder of UDENZ App said that this initiative is only the beginning of a series of initiatives which will encourage cooperation between business community and healthcare sector, in a time where the expenses of the healthcare sector is quite big and takes a lot from the expenses of organizations and companies now a days. PR
