Dubai — Mubasher: Dubai's gross domestic product (GDP) amounted to AED 389.4 billion in 2017, with a 2.8% growth in constant prices from AED 378.8 billion registered a year earlier, the Department of Economic Development (DED) said in a recent report.
While the UAE economy saw a 0.8% growth last year, the ‘Dubai Economic Report 2018’ said, highlighting the importance of Dubai's diverse production base in enabling the emirate to absorb the impact of lower oil prices and the region's unfavourable economic conditions.
In the same vein, the GCC emirate has been ranked fourth in the world and first among Gulf and Arab nations in terms of trade openness, according to Dubai's Trade Openness index of 321%, which measures the value of exports, imports and re-exports attributed to GDP.
Moreover, Dubai came fourth among the world's most visited cities last year, after attracting 15.8 million visitors, who spent AED 109 billion, with an annual increase of 6.7%, the report said.
The total value of Dubai's non-oil commodity trade stood at AED 1.3 trillion in 2017, with a 2% rise compared to the previous year, the report, which reviews the major macro- and sectoral level economic developments and growth in the emirate during 2017, found.
The value of foreign trade was on the rise in the first half of 2018 as the value of re-exports witnessed a significant increase of 14% compared to the prior-year period.
Dubai's trade with its top four trading partners, namely China, India, the US and Saudi Arabia, made up around a third of the total trade.
China was Dubai's largest trading partner for the second consecutive year, followed by India.
Dubai's trade with GCC countries registered AED 127 billion in 2017, up 10% year-on-year. Re-exports represented 53% of Dubai's total trade with other GCC nations.
The report underlined the growing role of tourism in sustaining economic development in Dubai.
“Tourism is among the most important activities in Dubai and the sector grew 8% in 2017, compared to 2.5% in 2016, and contributed 5% of the GDP of Dubai. Tourism is also expected to grow further ahead of Expo 2020 and particularly during the six-month exhibition period, from October 2020 to April 2021,” it said.
More than 270,000 new jobs are expected to be created in different sectors as a result of the Expo 2020 Dubai and allied activities, with a major share of the jobs coming from the hotels and restaurants, it added.
The six-month event will be held on 20 October 2020 to 10 April 2021 and is expected to welcome more than 25 million visitors.
