RIYADH — Minister of Human Resources and Social Development Ahmed Al-Rajhi launched on Thursday the National Award for Voluntary Work and the electronic application of the National Platform for Voluntary Work. The launching ceremony was held at the ministry's headquarters here in the presence of a number of senior government officials and leaders of non-profit sectors, as well as members of the National Committee for Voluntary Work. Speaking on the occasion, Minister Al-Rajhi stressed that volunteer work is one of the objectives of the Kingdom's Vision 2030, and a prominent sign of a social renaissance. "It is an effective contributor to the efforts of community development. One of the motivational efforts to spread the culture of volunteering in the community is the establishment of awards, volunteer competitions and activating their roles in order to highlight and appreciate various stakeholders involved in volunteer work," he said. In her speech, Mashael Al Mubarak, director-general of the General Department of Voluntary Work at the ministry, said that the move to initiate the national awards for volunteer work is clear evidence of the clear vision to activate the role of society in all its sectors and categories. It also contributes to activating the task of community participation, which is consistent with the orientations of the enhanced vision to encourage volunteer work and deepen its impact and role at the national level, she pointed out. The National Award for Voluntary Work targets six main categories: government; private; non-profit sectors; universities, colleges and education departments; voluntary teams, and community members. It seeks to be an incubator and motivator for these sectors to actively participate in volunteer work. The award aims to motivate and appreciate individuals and sectors to build, design and implement innovative and qualitative volunteer initiatives that have an impact on meeting the needs and issues of society, in addition to consolidating and strengthening concepts and practices of sustainable volunteering and achieving integration and solidarity between different sectors and community volunteers. The award contains three tracks: volunteer projects; volunteer support, and individual volunteers. It aims to honor the efforts of volunteers in innovative projects implemented on the ground, and encourage organizations that support volunteering to provide an institutional environment that attracts volunteer work, in addition to creating a motivational system to increase the number of volunteers and the sustainability of their volunteer participation. The newly launched National Platform for Voluntary Work is a Saudi incubator for volunteer work so as to provide a safe environment that serves and regulates the relationship between the agencies that provide volunteer opportunities and volunteers in the Kingdom. Its advantages include documenting volunteer hours for volunteers and highlighting them in the Absher platform, and simply the procedures for searching volunteer opportunities, with the possibility of putting forward ideas and creative initiatives.
