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GALLERY
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Located strategically in the middle
east, Dubai has
become a trading hub, thanks to the progressive
policies adopted by the government of the tiny
emirate.
Dubai is a successor to the fabulous Qais and
Hormuz which had flourished before the coming of the
Europeans into the region.
Dubai has been a poor underdeveloped area in the last century just
like any other
desert kingdoms
in the middle east.
Trading , Fishing and Pearl diving have been
the means of sustenance of the people.
Even though, traders used to visit Dubai and
made it a trading center, the main port in the
region was Lingeh, in the Strait of Hormuz.
Lingeh was
under Arab tribal rule till the latter part
of the 19th century when Iran took over
the area and
established their administration in 1902. Iranian Customs collection rates were overwhelmingly high
and the traders shifted their business interests to
the adjacent port of Dubai.
Dubai benefited from Lingeh's misfortune.
HH Shaikh Maktoum bin Hasher who was gifted with a
seer’s vision to the future of Dubai,
welcomed the merchants, craftsmen, traders
and pearl divers. The port grew rapidly and became a
regular port of call for steamer from 1902. Thus the
importance of Lingeh declined and Dubai rose to
prominence.
Dubai was in reality looking for a break.
Pearl diving was slowly becoming less
profitable in the wake of arrival of
cultured pearl ,
especially from Japan. Till
then, the economy
largely depended on the Pearl trade, and
towards the end of 19th century, Pearl
trading was the premier industrial activity in
Dubai. The
monetary crisis in the 1930s struck the first major
blow to the pearl industry.
Soon cultured pearls began to flood the
market and by
1950 the local pearl diving community had all but lost its status as an
industry.
But the most important turn in Dubai’s economy was brought on by
the discovery of oil in the
early sixties. The discovery of oil brought
forth revolutionary changes in Dubai’s economy.
It was then a meteoric rise.
All efforts were directed towards
the exploitation of the black gold.
The revenue from oil came just in time to
finance the major development projects of 70's and
80's. Since 1973, the UAE has undergone
a profound transformation from an impoverished
region of small desert principalities to a modern
state with a high standard of living. The first export of
petroleum was in 1962; since then
Dubai never looked back.
By the eighties,
this region
had the highest per capita income in the
world.
However,
all along, the importance of petroleum in the
economic main stream was having a stranglehold on
the economic stability of the emirate.
The rulers were wise enough to
recognize this
danger.
In 1998, the country faced an economic
depression following a fall in oil prices. To ensure
the country did not encounter similar negative
fallouts in the future , the government implemented
policies that have continued despite the oil boom of
1999.
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