Dubai Petrochemical Middle East will invest up to US$90 million to develop a new chemical terminal in Jebel Ali Port to expand its business in the region. The port’s operator said that the company and DP World signed a 30-year lease agreement for the project, which is expected to help promote more trade to and from Dubai.

"Despite the highly unstable market caused by the pandemic, during 2020, the GCC's chemical production increased by 1.5%, while the global decline was 2.6%. These figures demonstrate the resilience of the industry and its potential," Jafza ( Said Abdullah bin Damitan, CEO and managing director of the UAE business of Jebel Al and DP World. The new terminal is expected to be completed in the third quarter of 2023 and will have the capacity to store approximately 40,000 cubic meters of products, as well as distillation and processing equipment.

Mr. Bin Damithan said that it will provide a large amount of chemical raw materials for the traditional and new industries that the UAE is building, and it is expected to bring more than 200 million U.S. dollars in new trade to Dubai every year. Dubai’s non-oil foreign trade grew by 10% in the first quarter to 354.4 billion dirhams (96.5 billion U.S. dollars). Exports increased by 25% to AED 50.5 billion, while imports increased by 9% to AED 204.8 billion. According to the Dubai Media Office, the value of re-exports increased by 5.5% to Dh99 billion.

"The petrochemical industry is a priority development area for countries and regions. Due to its geographic location, Jafza is a strategic gateway to the Middle East, Africa and South Asia, accounting for about 70% of the UAE's petrochemical products foreign trade," said bin Damithan. Jebel Ali Port supports more than 10,000 chemical manufacturers and traders, and Jebel Ali Free Zone has a petrochemical cluster covering an area of 4 million square meters. It owns more than 500 petrochemical companies.

Keywords: Foreign Engineering News

Petrochem Middle East CEO Yogesh Mehta said: “Today, our annual turnover exceeds 2.5 billion dirhams. Through new projects, we expect short-term and long-term gains to account for about 10-15% of our investment.” Editor/XuNing、Design/ZhangTao