Dubai construction sector expected to begin improving late this year

Dubai : Industry experts believe that the construction industry will not start looking up until the end of 2010.

Ali Bu Rahima, deputy director general of the Dubai Technology and Media Free Zone Authority said this week at a conference that Dubai's main hinderance in the industry is the lack of liquidity.

"Dubai has the technical expertise as many international companies have based themselves in Dubai.

It's the economy that will be the industry's main challenge in the coming months in Dubai and I don't think this will get better until the end of 2010."

Bu Rahima believes that in this difficult time Dubai should focus on the projects that are already underway and build the infrastructure around them.

Losses

Sanzio Vaienti, global sales director at Soilmec an Italian based company which manufactures drilling and piling machinery, is one of the many companies that has experienced losses in the last year.

"Dubai is a very important market to us. However recently due to the downturn it has not done so well and it probably won't pick up until the later end of this year We made a 70 per cent loss in 2009 in the UAE. Globally we made a 50 per cent loss."

Infrastructure

The challenges faced in infrastructure building in Dubai was one of the topics discussed at the third Piling and Deep Foundations Middle East 2010 conference which is taking place between February 1 and 3

As well as acting as a networking event for industry members, the event aims to highlight the importance of using time cost effective foundation systems and ensuring satisfactory project deliverables.