Dubai Chamber Hosts Big 5 Business Networking Meeting

The Dubai Chamber of Commerce and Industry hosted the Big 5 Breakfast Briefing 2016, a business networking meeting for its private sector members and their regional and global counterparts from the construction industry, at the Chamber premises.

The business networking event was organised on the side-lines of the Big 5 show which is the largest construction exhibition in the region attracting over 75,000 participants and hosting 3,000 exhibitors from 70 countries at the Dubai World Trade Centre.

Coming directly within the framework of Dubai Chamber’s efforts to facilitate interaction between different stakeholders, the business networking meeting provided an ideal platform for representatives of the real estate and construction businesses and building material groups to work together for the economic growth of their particular sector while contributing to the overall development of the emirate.

The attendees, both local and international, got the unique opportunity to discuss issues and trends currently prevailing in the construction market while also to brainstorm to find solutions and plan out the future course of action needed for the growth of the sector.

In his welcome address, Omar Khan, Director, International Offices, said that Dubai is experiencing a construction boom at the moment. The Big 5 exhibition this year comes at a very exciting time for the construction sector with 3,700 projects worth a total of $400 billion currently ongoing across the emirate.

He said, “Infrastructure spend on Dubai Expo 2020 alone is expected to reach $9 billion, and 71,000 new hotels are currently in the pipeline in the emirate as it is undergoing rapid expansion and has embarked on an ambitious diversification strategy under the Dubai Plan 2021, which places a major focus on boosting investment in key growth sectors such as transport, logistics, aviation, real estate, finance, retail and hospitality.

“With Expo 2020 just a few years away, you can feel the momentum building with the construction of new buildings and major infrastructure projects such as the Dubai Canal, and the expansion of the Dubai Metro and Al Maktoum International Airport. The preparations for Expo 2020 are acting as a catalyst for growth in the emirate’s construction market,” he added.

The Director of Dubai Chamber International Offices informed that the Chamber endeavours to promote all Dubai events, especially trade exhibitions and conferences like the latest Big 5 show and to provide direct access to Dubai’s construction and real estate businesses to meet their global counterparts and work jointly towards enhancing trade ties with a wider global business community.

According to Dubai Chamber presentation, in 2015 together the construction and real estate sectors contributed about 13.1%, with 6.8% and 6.3% respectively. With the increase in Dubai approved government budget for 2016 to about US$ 12.6 billion from US$ 11.1 billion in 2015, the Dubai government is planning to maintain the size of its investments in infrastructure over the next five years.

The presentation further pointed out that Dubai’s connectivity and transport infrastructure dominated the infrastructure segment with transport taking 43.1% followed by energy and utilities with 29.3% and social infrastructure with 27.6% while the most highly traded construction products were steel (48.3%) and heating, ventilation, air-conditioning and refrigeration with 16.4%.

The presentation pointed at Expo 2020, Dubai as Smart and Sustainable City and Green Buildings as potential opportunity areas for within the construction and building materials trading sectors.