Dubai Municipality is capable of financing the planned Dh30 billion Desert Rose sustainable city project on its own, an official said yesterday.
The project, located south of Emirates Road, will house 120,000 nationals and 40,000 expatriates by 2025 in so called affordable housing, said Abdullah Rafia, assistant director general at Dubai Municipality.
“We will look into all financing mechanisms that are available and we are open to public private sector kind of cooperation,” said Mr Rafia at Meed’s Destination Dubai conference.
“If we need to do it from our budget it is not a problem for us. We do have an income that we give at the end of the year to the government and if we keep it we can build the city as fast as we want.” Dubai Municipality, a master developer, will start awarding its first contract for consultancy for infrastructure design next month and break ground on the project by the end of this year, he said.
“We are about to award. We have finished with the shortlisting. I expect by early next month [we will award],” said Mr Rafia.
Although the city’s last phase is expected to be built by 2025, Dubai Municipality can speed up the construction to finish it by 2020, he said.
“We are leaving the time scale to the government. If they decide to accelerate, we can do it,” Mr Rafia
“First we start with infrastructure and during the infrastructure [phase] we start designing our houses. We look at how fast we want to go. Then we can start our superstructure construction at the areas where we finish the infrastructure construction.”
The city will cover 4,000 hectares and will include 30,000 housing units, with 20,000 of them dedicated to Emiratis.
Dwellings will be built next to a light electric rail system, which will be connected to Dubai Metro. It will also have 1 million square metres of diverse activities and will include social infrastructure such as schools and hospitals.
The environment-friendly city, in the shape of the desert rose, will reduce the carbon footprint by 300,000 tonnes a year as it will have its own renewable energy plant with an anticipated capacity of 200 megawatts. Solar panels will be installed on all rooftops to produce renewable energy.
Dubai is currently in the midst of a construction boom, having overtaken Abu Dhabi last year in terms of contract awards, according to Meed Projects.
About US$27.8 billion worth of projects were awarded in Dubai last year and this figure is expected to rise to around $30bn this year, despite the oil price drop and an anticipated weakening of the UAE economy, said Ed James, a director at Meed Projects.
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Brief scores
Toss India, chose to bat
India 281-7 in 50 ov (Pandya 83, Dhoni 79; Coulter-Nile 3-44)
Australia 137-9 in 21 ov (Maxwell 39, Warner 25; Chahal 3-30)
India won by 26 runs on Duckworth-Lewis Method
Skewed figures
In the village of Mevagissey in southwest England the housing stock has doubled in the last century while the number of residents is half the historic high. The village's Neighbourhood Development Plan states that 26% of homes are holiday retreats. Prices are high, averaging around £300,000, £50,000 more than the Cornish average of £250,000. The local average wage is £15,458.
The smuggler
Eldarir had arrived at JFK in January 2020 with three suitcases, containing goods he valued at $300, when he was directed to a search area.
Officers found 41 gold artefacts among the bags, including amulets from a funerary set which prepared the deceased for the afterlife.
Also found was a cartouche of a Ptolemaic king on a relief that was originally part of a royal building or temple.
The largest single group of items found in Eldarir’s cases were 400 shabtis, or figurines.
Khouli conviction
Khouli smuggled items into the US by making false declarations to customs about the country of origin and value of the items.
According to Immigration and Customs Enforcement, he provided “false provenances which stated that [two] Egyptian antiquities were part of a collection assembled by Khouli's father in Israel in the 1960s” when in fact “Khouli acquired the Egyptian antiquities from other dealers”.
He was sentenced to one year of probation, six months of home confinement and 200 hours of community service in 2012 after admitting buying and smuggling Egyptian antiquities, including coffins, funerary boats and limestone figures.
For sale
A number of other items said to come from the collection of Ezeldeen Taha Eldarir are currently or recently for sale.
Their provenance is described in near identical terms as the British Museum shabti: bought from Salahaddin Sirmali, "authenticated and appraised" by Hossen Rashed, then imported to the US in 1948.
- An Egyptian Mummy mask dating from 700BC-30BC, is on offer for £11,807 ($15,275) online by a seller in Mexico
- A coffin lid dating back to 664BC-332BC was offered for sale by a Colorado-based art dealer, with a starting price of $65,000
- A shabti that was on sale through a Chicago-based coin dealer, dating from 1567BC-1085BC, is up for $1,950
At a glance
Global events: Much of the UK’s economic woes were blamed on “increased global uncertainty”, which can be interpreted as the economic impact of the Ukraine war and the uncertainty over Donald Trump’s tariffs.
Growth forecasts: Cut for 2025 from 2 per cent to 1 per cent. The OBR watchdog also estimated inflation will average 3.2 per cent this year
Welfare: Universal credit health element cut by 50 per cent and frozen for new claimants, building on cuts to the disability and incapacity bill set out earlier this month
Spending cuts: Overall day-to day-spending across government cut by £6.1bn in 2029-30
Tax evasion: Steps to crack down on tax evasion to raise “£6.5bn per year” for the public purse
Defence: New high-tech weaponry, upgrading HM Naval Base in Portsmouth
Housing: Housebuilding to reach its highest in 40 years, with planning reforms helping generate an extra £3.4bn for public finances
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