Dubai: A 100-day plan for comprehensive development of the recently announced Al Quoz Creative Zone was laid out during the first Al Quoz Accelerators workshop, it was announced on Thursday.
The workshop was launched by Dubai Culture and Arts Authority (Dubai Culture) in cooperation with its partners at Alserkal Avenue in Al Quoz.
It brought together representatives from committee members as well as from the emirate’s creative community to develop Al Quoz Creative Zone. The workshop also set timelines and drew a roadmap for the next five years to ensure the region’s sustainable growth and prosperity. Discussions on establishing Al Quoz Creative Membership and nominating creative people to obtain long-term cultural visas were also held as part of the workshop.
“It succeeded in laying out the components of the 100-day plan, constituting a comprehensive development plan to determine the priorities of the committee members’ work to develop the zone and strengthen its position as an integrated, dynamic and creative centre as well as a regional and global incubator for creative individuals and companies, setting timelines and drawing a roadmap for the next five years to ensure the region’s sustainable growth and prosperity,” said the release.
Sheikha Latifa bint Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum, Chairperson of Dubai Culture, had recently appointed the members to the committee that she is currently chairing to develop Al Quoz Creative Zone to strengthen the emirate’s position as a regional and international centre for the creative economy within an integrated system that would contribute to achieving Dubai’s comprehensive economic development.
This followed the directives of His Highness Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum, Vice-President and Prime Minister of the UAE and Ruler of Dubai, to transform Dubai into the global capital of the creative economy by 2025.
Fundamentals of creative economy
Hala Badri, Director-General of Dubai Culture, inaugurated the Al Quoz Accelerators workshop in the presence of its partners, and representatives from the committee members and the creating community, touching upon the fundamentals of the creative economy and its importance as a supporter of other economic sectors. She provided a glimpse of the performance of this economy at the global and local levels as well as shed light on the most important pillars for developing the creative economy in Dubai and achieve the vision of the Dubai Creative Economy Strategy launched by Sheikh Mohammed.
Hala Badri said: “Decades ago, Dubai invested in establishing sophisticated, creative complexes in various sectors that attracted a large number of companies and innovators from around the world. The emirate’s creative industries possess strong and promising capabilities to play a pivotal role in serving the sustainable development goals.”
She further said: “Improving Dubai’s competitiveness in the field of creative economy rests on several pillars, most important of which is the development of an integrated infrastructure for the prosperity of creative people and industries. We seek to achieve this through the development of Al Quoz Creative Zone with our partners while preserving the region’s spirit of originality to provide a pioneering environment and a comprehensive system that would meet the requirements for developing the creative sector in the emirate, ensuring that it is a strong competitor to similar regions in the world.”
Strategic objectives
Hala Badri added: “We worked with wasl Asset Management Group (AMG), the Roads and Transport Authority (RTA) in Dubai, Dubai Municipality, Dubai Economy, Department of Tourism and Commerce Marketing (Dubai Tourism), and representatives from the creative community to develop an integrated system that would support the creative economy. Our ultimate goal is to become a centre of attraction for creative talents from around the world and to become a global community and capital for the creative economy.”
The workshop included dialogue sessions moderated by members from Dubai Culture in addition to five working groups, each of which addressed one of the workshop’s main topics. The topics included multipurpose laws and spaces, physical infrastructure, creative business support system for ease of services and business establishment, attracting talents and perceptions of the creative community.
The working groups brought together representatives from wasl AMG, Dubai Municipality, RTA, Dubai Tourism and Dubai Economy as well as representatives of the creative community, which tangibly engages members of this community in developing creative ideas to enhance the strengths of Al Quoz and identify realistic solutions to overcome the challenges.
The teams addressed the strengths of Al Quoz; the weaknesses or challenges facing the creative community; the available opportunities and capabilities; and innovative, creative ideas.
Mechanism for exchanging information
The workshop resulted in a road map for Al Quoz Creative Zone over the next five years, the components of the 100-day plan and time frames for its implementation were defined, and dates were set for future meetings with committee members and project-based working groups as well as developing a mechanism for exchanging information on developments.
At the conclusion of the sessions, a number of creative people were nominated to obtain long-term cultural visas.
The committee members for developing Al Quoz Creative Zone include Vice-Chairman of the committee, Mattar Al Tayer, Director-General and Chairman of the Board of Executive Directors of RTA; Dawoud Al Hajri, Director-General of Dubai Municipality; Sami Al Qamzi, Director-General of Dubai Economy; Helal Saeed Almarri, Director-General of Dubai Tourism; Hala Badri, Director-General of Dubai Culture; and Hesham Abdullah Al Qassim, CEO of wasl AMG.
