Riyadh: Saudi Arabia has been honored – for decades to serve the Two Holy Mosques and their guests, where millions of pilgrims and visitors are received annually for Hajj and Umrah. The Saudi Vision 2030 has brought about a quantum leap in various areas such as facilities, quality of services, enrichment of cultural experience, and promotion of Islamic identity. The Kingdom’s security, service, and logistics sectors’ efforts have succeeded every year in managing and organizing the crowds coming to the Madinah and Makkah regions. These efforts must be accompanied by projects and initiatives. The Ministry of the Interior has launched the Makkah Route Initiative within the Pilgrims Experience Program, one of the Saudi Vision 2030 programs. This initiative, in cooperation with partner agencies, aims to improve the quality of services provided to pilgrims from the initiative terminals at the airports of the receiving countries and has made progress in establishing the concept of service honor in subsequent years.
A
s pilgrim numbers increased annually, the Ministry of the Interior invested in the Makkah Route Initiative this year (1445H/2024) – the sixth year of its operation – using portable devices, specifically a fingerprint biometric tablet enhanced by Artificial Intelligence (AI) and innovative digital solutions at 11 airports in seven countries benefiting from the initiative. These countries include Morocco, Indonesia, Malaysia, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Trkiye, and the Ivory Coast. The devices streamline the beneficiaries’ procedures by taking vital characteristics and passenger photos, reading passport data, and facilitating services for elderly and disabled individuals with the highest safety and reliability in cooperation with the Saudi Data and Artificial Intelligence Authority (SDAIA).
The portable device is equipped with a fingerprint sensor, passport reader, front and rear cameras, and a network for processing beneficiaries’ data within the Ministry of the Interior’s systems. This system is used for approval
to verify the safety of travel and visa documents and to support passport operators at ports during peak seasons to increase capacity and reduce congestion. This effort aims to transform temporary ports into international ports to enhance efficiency.
Source: Saudi Press Agency