In a fast-changing, technology-driven world, lethargy is a dangerous word for individuals as well as countries.

Anticipating future challenges, goal-driven performance and continuous upgradation are unavoidable necessities for nations to shine and achieve peace, progress and prosperity.

The UAE, fortunately, is blessed with a leadership that looks forward and anticipates the future so that the country leads globally.

As His Highness Sheikh Mohammed Bin Rashid Al Maktoum, Vice President and Prime Minister of the UAE and Ruler of Dubai, points out, shaping the future and making it is no longer a theoretical concept but a key factor for countries to achieve competitiveness in the global arena.

The future is not built on possibilities and numbers but on clarity of vision, planning, action and implementation.

While the digital transformation of all aspects of life has yielded rich dividends on manifold fronts, UAE’s efforts to become a leading global centre of 3D printing is particularly remarkable.

Dubai Municipality entering the Guinness Book of World Records last week for completing the largest 3D printed two-storey structure in the world, with a height of 9.5 metres, has added another feather to the Emirate’s cap.

This latest accomplishment is in line with the directives of Sheikh Mohammed to construct 25 per cent of buildings in the Emirate utilising 3D printing technology by 2030.

Dawoud Al Hajri, Director-General of Dubai Municipality, has correctly stated that the project is a major turning point in the construction sector at the local and regional levels based on the strategy of innovation in 3D printing technologies in construction.

This, in turn, will increase the pace and speed of execution and completion of buildings, and reduce construction costs and contribute to the development of solutions to the demographic challenges by reducing the number of construction workers.

Interestingly, the two-storey building has been designed and executed with a number of spaces that can be used as rooms or offices of different sizes. The walls are printed directly from the printer, unlike the traditional method of construction, which depends on the work of tightening wooden pieces with nuts and bolts, reinforcement and pouring of concrete and making bricks.

Also, the municipality has ensured that the materials used in the mixture are local materials available in the country. The building has been executed according to sustainability requirements and green building standards.

The country has been consistently utilising 3D printing technology. On May 23, 2016, the UAE inaugurated the ‘Office of the Future’, the world’s first fully functional 3D printed building.

Earlier this year, the Ministry of Health and Prevention unveiled a plan to use 3D printing technology in its six dental centres across six Emirates, starting from Dubai to ending in Fujairah, adding that 3D printing will be used to create fillings, fixtures and dental implants.

In May, Dubai witnessed the use of the first alternative prosthetic implants using 3D print technology on a 66-year old patient who had lost hope of walking again after suffering from osteoarthritis.

In July, a team from “FabLab UAE,” a subsidiary of the Hamdan Bin Rashid Al Maktoum Foundation for Excellence in Educational Performance, developed an industrial-scale 3D printer, the first of its kind in the UAE, with the ability to create large 3D models.

The global 3D printing sector is expected to be worth around $120 billion by 2020 and $300 billion by 2025.

It is good that the UAE has already made great strides in this sector.