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Dubai’s construction boom, fuelled by the growth in tourism and property sales sees the import of cement increase 74% in 2007. Dubai’s efforts to reinvent itself as an international playground for the super rich has seen the some of the world’s most ambitious construction projects including the Dubai Palm Island, an area of reclaimed land stretching three miles out to sea that will when completed contain 2000 villas and 40 luxury hotels. To support the growth of the area the world’s largest concrete reservoirs are being created which will contain 180 million gallons of drinking water.
The construction growth has seen the importation of raw materials saw, with 1.26 million tonnes of cement and 9 million tonnes of steel imported into the region in 2007. Dubai is now the 9th biggest importer of steel in the world which considering its population is only just over one hand a half million demonstrates the staggering growth. To encourage further development the government has announced the abolition of import duties on both steel and cement.
Dubai’s attempts to move from its traditional oil based economy have been very successful and its political stability and development of free trade zones have seen large scale inward investment with firms such as Oracle, IBM and Microsoft establishing offices in the TECOM (Dubai Technology, Electronic Commerce and Media Free Zone Authority).
With no end in sight to the Dubai property boom and even more ambitious land reclamation projects in the planning stages Dubai remains one of the major property hotspots in the world.
24 March 2008
Author: Katie Morgan
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