Editorial TeamThis isn’t the first time China has invested majorly in KIZAD, they are but strengthening the relations between China and UAE. Both global powers have been in each other’s scopes for at least 2 years and the newly proposed East Hope investment would be implemented over the course of 15 years in 3 stages.
The 1st stage would begin with an alumina facility, the 2nd stage would implement a red-mud research centre along with a recycling project and finally, the 3rd stage would be large upstream and downstream facilities to process non-ferrous metals.
East Hope Group and Emirates Global Aluminum are some of the world’s largest aluminium producers and both organisations from China and UAE have partnered to support the Emirate development plan.
China and UAE ties have improved immensely in recent years, especially since economic relations began back in 2010. Bilateral trading increased from $17 billion to nearly $60 billion within a 7-year period. Furthermore, there is a rather large community of Chinese in Dubai, an estimate of around 300,000 and approximately 4,000 of them have Chinese-owned businesses operating there.
Chinese state-owned organisations and multinationals have established a presence in the Jebel Ali Free Zone by servicing contracts throughout most of the Middle East. What is more, the ruler of Dubai Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid al-Maktoum represented the UAE at the recent Belt and Road Forum in Beijing, where $3.4 billion in deals were signed between both Dubai and China firms.
