Abu Dhabi: The UAE plays a vital role in re-energising trade and investment worldwide and is now the regional headquarters of over 25 per cent of the top 500 companies in the world, said Shaikha Lubna Al Qasimi, Minister of Foreign Trade.

Speaking at the official release of Why UAE, a new book about setting up business here, and the official launch of the UAE foreign trade relations map, Shaikha Lubna said the UAE is now diversifying its economy by relying on non-oil sectors.

With regard to the foreign trade relations map, she said it would help to attract investment projects to the country.

Information

"The map represents an interactive and dynamic bilingual Arabic and English website of its kind in the region that provides economic, trade and investment information on world countries based on a series of international reports issued by international organisations," she said.

She pointed out that such information and reports are also based on data on UAE investments abroad and trade between the UAE and other parts of the world and enables investors and exporters to acquire relevant and essential information to discover new markets.