UAE leads Gulf market integration

The GCC Secretariat recently issued its fifth annual statistical report called ‘The GCC Common Market's Facts and Figures’ which featured issues of GCC citizens that relate to the Gulf Common Market (GCM) such as residency, equality in the public and private spheres, protection and insurance, education and health.

Commenting on the report, Obaid Humaid Al Tayer, Minister of State for Financial Affairs, praised the considerable efforts made by the secretariat to implement the decisions of the Supreme Council.

The report highlighted the GCC states' commitment to achieve equality of treatment within the GCC for citizens' movement and residence, by allowing them to move between counties using their personal IDs.

This is important in promoting commercial relations and in consolidating social inter-dependence. In fact, statistics of the General Secretariat showed that citizens who moved within the GCC countries in 2011 exceeded 13 million.

The report also revealed the decisions of the Supreme Council to grant full equality for GCC citizens regarding their employment in government sectors, social insurance, and pension plans as well the exclusion of any restrictions preventing this positive step.

The report showed the presence of 17,000 citizens working in the public sector in other member states in the year 2011, whereby the UAE received more than 4,000 of them, a ratio of 24 per cent on a GCC level. As for those employed in the private sector in other member states, the number of GCC employees amounted to 24,000 in the year 2011 with a total of 1,230 employees in the UAE.

The statistics have also shown that the number of beneficiaries of the equalised pension systems in other member states reached 9,140 citizens by the end of the year 2011, where the UAE presented these plans to 4,012 GCC nationals, a ratio of 44 per cent. With regard to social insurance systems, 6,069 citizens received them during 2011 with 1,230 citizens in the UAE alone, a ratio of 20 per cent.

Al Tayer added: "The Ministry of Finance is committed to following up on the progress of the Gulf Common Market activities in the UAE to enable the provision of all  services and insurance for GCC citizens working in both public and private sectors, which in turn will help in achieving the full implementation of all decisions passed in this regard."

As for the education sector, the report revealed that the number of students from the GCC receiving education in other member states was 16,696 at the elementary level, 12,777 students in middle school along with 8,529 students in the secondary level in 2011. The number of students enrolled in institutions of higher education in other member states reached 6,107 in 2011.

GCC property ownership in other member states amounted to 93,767 registered cases by the end of 2011 compared to 77,804 cases in 2010.

The UAE was ranked first in attracting GCC nationals to buy land during the year 2011, with the number of real estate ownership reaching 10,873 -- a ratio of 67.5 per cent at the GCC level. Until 2011, the cumulative number of GCC, non- Emirati ownership in the UAE reached 44,902.

"The UAE has set itself apart by its solid infrastructure facilities and its commitment to treating GCC individuals and entities equally without any discrimination. This has placed the UAE at the forefront in terms of applying GCM-related efforts, particularly in real estate ownership," he added.

With regard to economic, investment and service activities, the Supreme Council's decisions provided an opportunity for the GCC citizens to obtain licences to do business in the other GCC countries, where the cumulative number of such licences reached 34,428 licenses until 2011. The UAE is considered to be the GCC's leading country for such licences until 2011, reaching 28,909 licences, or 84 per cent. The UAE's commercial banks are the most prevalent in the GCC up to 2011, where their branches make up approximately 27 per cent of GCC bank branches in other member states.

Following the decision of the Supreme Council at its seventh session, GCC investors are allowed to obtain loans from banks and industrial development funds of member states. The value of those loans reached $1.4 billion by the end of the year 2011.

In areas of trading and buying stocks and the establishment of joint stock companies, the number of companies that have permission to trade their stocks for GCC nationals amounted to 661 joint-stock companies in 2011, with a capital up to about $220 billion. The UAE topped GCC states for attracting shareholders from the Gulf, which reached 212,243 contributors with a rate of 46.5 per cent of the total equity.

Al Tayer reiterated that the UAE has all the elements to attract investments from around the world, given its adoption of global economic and investment practices, and the bilateral trade agreements signed by the UAE that enables it to be one of the most prominent investment destinations on the international and regional levels, especially Gulf investments.

With regard to inter-GCC trade, the Gulf Free Trade Zone and the GCC Customs Union regulations and policies adopted in this area have had a role in promoting the smooth movement of goods and services and transportation between member states. It also helped promote national products and activate the role of the private sector in the development of the exports of the GCC countries, which was evident by the large volume of bilateral trade of $6 billion in 1984 compared to over $85 billion in 2011.

This has led to a rise in intraregional exports from the UAE to the rest of the GCC, which was registered at $9,626.2 million in 2011 with a growth rate of 9 per cent for exports in 2010, while the value of imports reached $7,575.7 million in 2011, an increase of 26 per cent from 2010.

As for the unified Gulf standard specifications, the GCC Standardisation Organisation works towards preparing, adopting and publishing the unified GCC standards for goods and products, where it managed until 2011 to put 6,510 specs and a unified and supported Gulf list.

"The Ministry of Finance will spare no efforts in taking all the steps that will enhance and deepen Gulf economic integration in an effort to improve the GCC common market to achieve what serves the interests of the GCC countries and their citizens," said Al Tayer.


 

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