First two days of Italian Lifestyle in the Emirates Exhibition attracts over 4,600 visitors

The Italian Lifestyle in the Emirates Exhibition, in its fourth edition this year, got off to a grand start on May 29, 2007.

Till the evening of May 30, 2007, the event had attracted a total of 4,610 visitors. A majority of the visitors were from the GCC region including the UAE.

Of the total visitors, a significant number were from the regional contracting sector and other related industries. This may be attributed to the exhibition's primary focus on furniture, furnishings, and the interior décor sectors. This focus assumes special significance, given the construction boom that the region is currently experiencing.

In 2006, export of Italian building materials to the UAE increased by 50% with export of pipes registering a 128 % rise while that of metals (excluding iron) growing by 245 %. Italy's export of furniture to the UAE in 2006 amounted to Dh 485 million (98.3 million euros), up 11.9 % from Dh 433.13 million (87.8 million euros) in 2005.



One of the other reasons for the large turnout of trade visitors at the Italian Lifestyle in the Emirates Exhibition is the presence of over 50 Italian food companies, providing a perfect opportunity to the regional retailers to source high quality and authentic Italian food items.



Italian food exhibits at the event include agricultural produces, artisan pasta and gastronomic specialties, barbecues and coffee machines, biological food, cabra's botargo, chocolate specialties, coffee, confectionery, sweets, dried pasta specialties, extra virgin olive oil, mineral water, mullet botargo, tuna botargo, smoked fish, tuna fillet in olive oil, oil and local food, olives, sauces and condiments, sheep sausages and sheep ham, sugared almond and articles for bombonnières, vegetable preserves, vegetables and other high quality foodstuff.

For general visitors, particularly fashion enthusiasts, the main attraction at the exhibition has been the fashion accessories section. It is displaying Italian made bags, handbags, duffel bags, packs in different materials, ties, small leather goods, leather accessories, costume jewellery, natural cosmetics prepared from Sardinian herbs, fashion accessories and costume jewellery in Murano glass, gifts and fancy items.

The daily cooking demonstrations by the famous Italian chef, Umberto Creatini from Tuscany, has also been attracting a large number of people, especially connoisseurs of Italian food.