ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT - UAE Interact

108UNITED ARAB EMIRATES YEARBOOK 2006land title agreement or a renewable 50-year surface ownership deal. The firstinvestment areas to be so designated were Al Raha Beach and Al Reem Island. UAEcompanies are responsible for construction and development of properties in thetwo areas in coordination with the Department of Municipalities and Agriculture.The new properties will be offered for sale to the general public. Further resolutionsdesignating other areas in the emirate as investment areas are expected.Other emirates have been putting their own property laws in order and areensuring that ownership of properties by local people is properly registered.Coinciding with the announcements in Abu Dhabi, Ra’s al-Khaimah issued aresolution on documentation and title registration in the emirate. It stipulatedstandards for documentation of ownership, including old mud houses and farms,and stated that mountains and wadis are considered public property whileundeveloped land shall not be owned unless papers proving the ownership areproduced. It also provided for surveying and mapping of all lands where privateownership is established.Discussions are also under way on a federal property law that would introducestandardisation regarding property ownership issues throughout the UAE.Meanwhile, the property developers themselves have been in a process of almostvertical growth. Aldar Properties’ initial public offering attracted record interestand was over-subscribed nearly 448 times! Official trading of Aldar shares on theADSM started at 10.30 a.m. on 5 April 2005. Aldar shares par value was Dh1per share on listing, but the value soon rose and they were being traded at overDh10 in June 2005. Aldar has an impressive property portfolio, including majordevelopments and redevelopments. As outlined above, three projects ofinternational standing for Abu Dhabi have already been announced, the 45,000-square-metre Central Market redevelopment, the extensive Al Raha Beach gatewaydevelopment, and the Imperial College London Diabetes Centre building.Nakheel is one of the leading companies in Dubai’s property sector. Thecompany, whose Arabic name refers to the date-palm tree and its fruits, isinvolved in the construction of iconic mega-projects such as the Jumeirah, JebelAli and Deira ‘Palms’; ‘The World’; ‘Jewel of the Palm’; ‘The Jumeirah Islands’;‘Jumeirah Lake Towers’; ‘Jumeirah Village’; ‘The Gardens’; ‘Ibn Battuta ShoppingMall’; ‘International City’; ‘The Lost City’; ‘Discovery Gardens’; ‘Dubai DesignCentre’; and ‘Dubai Waterfront’.EMAAR Properties is a Public Joint Stock Company (PJSC) listed on the DubaiFinancial Market. In July 2005 EMAAR held an extraordinary general meeting atwhich it announced a second quarter profit of Dh1.2 billion and won shareholderapproval to raise its capital through a rights issue and also to raise the limit offoreign ownership to 49 per cent. The new 1:1 rights share issue was set at Dh5,with each share of face value of Dh1 and carrying a further Dh4 as premium, to