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They also met Karen Chupka, Senior Vice President Events and Conferences and John Kelly, International Marketing Manager, Consumer Electronic Association (CEA), organizers of the world's largest Consumer Electronic Show held in Las Vegas and discussed the exhibition industry in Dubai and outbound missions to potential US markets, especially the Consumer Electronic Show for the year 2011 and looked into the possibility of holding a CES event in the Emirate.
This business trip which took the Dubai Chamber officials mainly to Los Angeles which is one of the world's strongest economies and the largest city in California provided the Chamber officials with the opportunity to study the best business practices adopted by the LA Chamber and to highlight the investment opportunities available in the Emirates. The officials also discussed entering into a twin city relationship with Los Angeles as the trip also helped in the Chamber's continuous drive to open doors for its members into the US market.
As part of its strategy to explore new markets for its members and to activate channels of communications with top chambers of the world, Dubai Chamber's focus this time fell on Los Angeles which is the second largest city in the US and is known for its best business practices:
"Our visit to Los Angeles gave us an opportunity to strengthen bilateral ties with the most economically active state in America and to share information between both sides especially with the policy advocacy process and organizing events on a grand scale. We are also looking forward to enhancing cooperation and expanding business opportunities between both cities and to adopt their technology and strategies which will come in handy while serving our members in Dubai as we believe in providing the highest standard of services to all our stakeholders,"
said Hamad Buamim, Director General, Dubai Chamber.
A special Dubai Chamber study released recently indicated that the total imports of US from the UAE for the first nine months of 2009, valued at $1.3bn, represented a jump of 24% from the previous year's value of $1.0 bn. With exports declining by 12%, from $0.0 to $8.8 bn during the same period, balance of trade declined by 15% to $7.6bn.
The study further revealed that the main reason for the sharp increase was the spike in petroleum imports of US from the UAE in July, as shown in Fig 1. From an average monthly value of just over $100m, US imports from UAE in July 2009 reached a record high of $360m, for a year-on-year growth of 78%. The figure also shows that the third quarter is a peak period for US import from the UAE. In addition to this, the year-on-year growth for the third quarter of 2009 was significant at 43% despite the economic crisis that had been gripping the two countries.
Petroleum dominates US imports from UAE
Petroleum accounted for 58% of US imports from the UAE during the first 9 months of 2009, up from only 21% for corresponding period in 2008. When imports peaked in July 2009, 82% of the total imports consisted of petroleum oil, valued at $298m. It appears then, that the peaks noted in quarter three months, could be attributed to increased imports of petroleum crude oil products. US imports of petroleum and fuel generally increase in the summer months as the country stockpiles its reserves for the increased demand in winter. This explains the peaks in US imports from the UAE in the 3rd quarter, followed by slumps in the 4th quarter.
Fig. 2 shows, however, that US imports of petroleum in the first eight months of the year dropped significantly in 2009. Although part of the decline could be attributed to the decline in world prices of oil in 2009, from the peak levels a year ago, it could still be noted that compare to the same periods in 2006 and 2007, the 2009 level was still much lower.
US imports of petroleum in the first nine months of 2006 amounted to $344.0bn, increasing by 9% to $376.1bn in the following year. High prices and large demand in 2008 pushed import bill by 26% to $550.8bn. Thus, the $200.5bn imports in 2009 marked a 152% decline. It is, therefore surprising that US imports of the product from the UAE continued to rise.
Buamim maintained that Dubai and the US enjoy excellent economic relations as the country ranked third on the list of Dubai's top trading partners with the value of exports and re-exports of the Chamber's members to US touching Dhs5.74bn at the end of 2008. He informed that there are 1,034 US partnership companies including 102 US-owned firms operating in Dubai, which confirms the strong trading relationship that exist between the two sides.
Although US plays a major role in the development of UAE's oil industry, US imports of petroleum from UAE is very small. The significant jump in US imports of the product from UAE in July increased the share from barely 1% to about 4%, and led to a 243% year-on-year increase in imports of petroleum from the UAE during the first nine months of 2008. Thus, despite the relatively small share in the total, this increase contributed positively by 1% to the overall change.
Posted by Rima Ali Al Mashni
