Rasha Tabila (Abu Dhabi)
The Ministry of Economy has identified 5 main advantages of the Comprehensive Agreement for Economic Cooperation, which have become important milestones within the foreign trade strategy launched by the country, through which it wants to build stronger and more integrated trade relations with the most dynamic markets. world.
These benefits include improving access to global markets, reducing or eliminating customs duties, simplifying customs procedures, providing clear and transparent rules for economic cooperation, and promoting competition based on fair trade.
The UAE started to implement the first comprehensive economic agreement with India in February 2022, and the cooperation agreement with Morocco, while the talks were successfully concluded the day before yesterday, represents the last comprehensive economic cooperation agreement between the UAE and the outside world. The UAE has signed similar agreements, and continues to make more agreements with countries in Asia, Europe, Africa and South America. At the end of last May, the UAE and South Korea signed the Comprehensive Agreement for Economic Cooperation, to start a new phase. of economic cooperation and joint growth.
In order to help achieve the UAE’s economic goals, the Ministry of Economy is working to strengthen international partnerships with strategic markets around the world to strengthen the country’s position to work as a main gateway for the flow of trade and logistics services. , and the signing of comprehensive economic cooperation agreements is one of the main tools to achieve this strategic goal, in the implementation of the strategic plans announced within the “Fifty Projects” that direct the next phase of the country’s growth and sustainable development in the next fifty years. the years The comprehensive economic cooperation agreements are one of the achievements of the foreign trade program launched by the UAE, helping to increase the value of non-oil foreign trade to more than 4 trillion dirhams by 2031 by eliminating or reducing customs duties. access to exporters’ markets, and the removal of barriers to trade and the establishment of a platform for collaboration with the private sector.
Regarding the advantages and positives of the comprehensive economic cooperation agreements concluded by the Emirates, the Ministry confirmed that the agreements help give Emirati exports greater access to their target markets, improve access to markets for Emirati service providers in various sectors, and eliminate unnecessary technical barriers to support Emirati exporters and Emirati companies, as well as providing an open and non-discriminatory environment for cross-border trade with countries, and ensuring the use of international standards as the basis for technical regulations. that Emirati products will not be subject to anti-dumping investigations in target countries.
Investors and companies from the emirates and countries can benefit from the removal of most customs duties, the removal of barriers to trade in key sectors, and comprehensive economic cooperation agreements that help expand the scope of trade opportunities for small and medium-sized businesses. -size companies to develop and grow, and increase the flexibility of global supply chains. The agreements also help to double the value of non-oil trade between the UAE and the target countries and improve the UAE’s gross domestic product. The UAE’s gross domestic product reached 1.67 trillion dirhams at constant prices in 2023, achieving a growth of 3.6%, compared to the 2022 GDP of 1.61 trillion dirhams, according to preliminary estimates by the Federal Center for Competitiveness and Statistics.
The UAE’s economic diversification policies helped it achieve leaps in non-oil commodity trade volume, achieving a compound growth rate of 5.2% over the past ten years, establishing an upward growth trajectory that reflects strength and sustainability. its economic relations, its strategic location and as a nexus of globalism. Trade in non-oil goods increased by about 65% to 2.6 trillion dirhams by the end of 2023, compared to about 1.58 trillion dirhams in 2013, and the value of the UAE’s trade in non-oil goods increased over 10 years. More than 17.9 billion dirhams, about 10.3 billion dirhams for imports, 4.99 billion for re-exports and 2.6 billion for direct exports.
