Number of licensed accountants in UAE surpasses 1,100, says Bin Touq

Abdulla Bin Touq Al Marri, Minister of Economy and Tourism, attended the Chief Audit Executives (CAE) Conference 2026 at Hilton Abu Dhabi Yas Island, joining 820 Chief Audit Executives and internal audit leaders from 25 countries.

Held under the Minister’s patronage and organised by the UAE Internal Auditors Association (UAE IAA), the three-day conference brought together the leaders who give boards, regulators and investors independent assurance that organisations are well governed and well controlled.

In this context, Bin Touq affirmed that the UAE has continued to advance the legislative and regulatory framework governing the accounting and auditing profession through the issuance of the Accounting and Auditing Profession Law, which has strengthened oversight and governance while enhancing business transparency and efficiency in line with international best practices.

He stated: “The number of licensed accountants in the UAE has surpassed 1,100, and the Ministry aims to increase the number of individual practitioners to 1,500 over the next five years, alongside the development of a regulatory framework that leverages artificial intelligence to enhance the efficiency of oversight and inspection. The Ministry’s vision is centred on advancing the quality of professional practices, encouraging innovation, and strengthening oversight and governance across economic establishments of all types.” He also highlighted the vital role played by the UAE Internal Auditors Association in establishing advanced standards for the profession.

Under the theme “Connect. Innovate. Transform.”, the programme covered internal audit, corporate governance, enterprise compliance and internal controls, with a strong focus on the governance of artificial intelligence.

The conference comes as the UAE advances a national framework to move half of government sectors and services to agentic AI within two years. As intelligent systems take on decisions once made by people, demand is rising for independent assurance that those decisions are sound, controlled and accountable.

In turn, Dr Ali Bin Mohammed AlMuwaijei, Chairman of the Board of the UAE Internal Auditors Association, said: “When a machine makes the decision, someone must still tell the board it was the right one. That is the role of our profession. Trust attracts capital, and strong governance earns that trust. This Association will work with regulators, capital markets, listed companies and boards to make governance and assurance in the UAE a benchmark for the world.”

The programme opened with an AI Masterclass, followed by a two-day main conference with more than 40 speakers and over 23 Continuing Professional Education (CPE) credits. Sessions addressed AI governance and AI-enabled assurance, transformation risk, enterprise resilience, fraud investigation and integrated assurance. The Association also presented its report on the state of the internal audit profession in the UAE and introduced its Certified Executive Leadership programme (CELP), which prepares current and future Chief Audit Executives for board-level leadership.

As the affiliate of The Institute of Internal Auditors (IIA Global) in the United Arab Emirates, the UAE IAA connects its members directly to the profession’s global standards and leading practices. IIA Global was represented at the conference by Elizabeth Sullivan, Immediate Past Chair of the IIA North American Board, who addressed delegates on the first day of the main conference.

The speakers moved beyond principles to implementation, showing how leading practices are being applied inside organisations. The Association makes these practices available to its members so that they can study them and put them to work in their own organisations.

During the conference, the UAE IAA honoured 14 entities that achieved general conformance in their external quality assessments (EQA), recognising internal audit functions whose quality has been independently verified, a mark of strong governance in the organisations they serve. From the same platform, the Association thanked its sponsors and partners, whose support made the conference possible.

For boards, audit committees and listed companies, the message from Abu Dhabi was clear: strong governance is the foundation of market confidence, and an independent internal audit function is how it is tested and proven. The UAE IAA supports organisations through external quality assessments against the Global Internal Audit Standards, professional certification, executive development and benchmarking, and invites regulators, exchanges and companies to work with it in raising the standard of governance across the UAE economy.

The UAE Internal Auditors Association (UAE IAA) is the professional body for internal auditors in the United Arab Emirates and the UAE affiliate of The Institute of Internal Auditors (IIA Global), the profession’s global standard-setter. It advances the profession through certification, external quality assessments, professional education, conferences and leading-practice programmes.

WAM