Mr Al Jassmi said that technology has always been the backbone of UAE’s industrial strategy and it has proven to be the right strategy particularly during the pandemic when supply chain continuity could be maintained thanks to prior investments in robust, technologically advanced infrastructure.
According to Mr Al Jassmi the maritime industry has been slow to adopt new technology compared to aviation. However, Jebel Ali has been at the forefront of automation and digitalisation so it has managed to eliminate or reduce human intervention in operations at every stage.
Mr Al Jassmi added that Jebel Ali has always tried to involve customers in what they were doing by implementing technologies like EDI and blockchain while continuously holding discussions with customers on how they can improve systems.
Describing the Boxbay project Mr Al Jassmi said its concept and viability have been proven by now and it is going to cause a major disruption in port and terminal management as it is going to save a lot of time and costs with containers moving from vessel to terminal, and vice versa, using an entirely automated system.
“In the last year all stakeholders have been investing heavily in integrating processes and the good part is that today the language that we hear from everyone shows that they are willing to put in time and effort to exchange information which was not the case two years ago,” concluded Mr Al Jassmi.
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