With the Expo now getting closer, many commentators are wondering if Dubai will be able to ensure that the event delivers on its previous successes in the midst of pandemic-induced un-certainties

World Expos are platforms for host countries to exhibit their cities and flaunt their culture to a global market while formulating indelible international relations. Following suit, Expo 2020 will be a spectacular happening that will allow Dubai to showcase its brilliance, innovations, break-throughs, and vast potential for a bright future, all to a global audience.

With the expo now getting closer, many commentators are wondering if Dubai will be able to ensure that the event delivers on its previous successes in the midst of pandemic-induced un-certainties.

Ephemeral event with long-lasting impact

Shanghai hosted the highest number of visitors in 2010, welcoming a record-breaking 73 million attendees. Infrastructure, such as subway lines, air terminals, railway stations and the general urban structure, was given a face lift with an expo investment of about $45 billion. Tourism also soared — 13 per cent during the Spring Festival alone, while residential property-leasing vacancy rates fell from 15 to eight per cent during the expo. Demand for hotel rooms shot up 39 per cent from the expo happening in 2010 to 2019, and the average daily rate also increased by 30 per cent.

Riverfront properties, which were stamped as an outdated shipyard pre-expo, caught the eye of foreign investors who redeveloped and converted them into profitable retail and commercial ventures.

When Milan hosted the Expo in 2015, the hospitality industry and commercial services witnessed a hike of 1.3 to 4.2 per cent throughout the year; €6 billion was injected through foreign direct investment within three months.

Similarly, Japan also hosted a successful Expo in 2005 with 22 million visitors, 880,000 of whom were foreigners.

Dubai continues to lead the pack

Dubai has taken major steps and introduced sweeping changes to consolidate its position as the most resilient, future-focused and proactive city on the global map.

Policies in Dubai are formulated to stimulate the economy and make businesses thrive. Sheikh Hamdan bin Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum, Crown Prince of Dubai and Chairman of the Dubai Executive Council, released a Dh1.5 billion economic stimulus package for businesses when the pandemic hit last year. Furthermore, the relief package aimed to reduce the living cost for the residents across properties and industrial arenas when the government rolled out a 10 per cent discount on water and electricity bills.

As part of the emirate’s unremitting pursuance towards supporting the business community, to weather the challenges posed by Covid-19, a Dh50 billion fund was put to play to ensure business continuity and stability.

According to economic reports released by the Central Bank of the UAE, the collective value of all capital and liquidity measures adopted by the authority since the 14th of March 2020 increased to Dh256 billion, including Dh50 billion in capital buffer relief, Dh50 billion in zero-cost funding support, and Dh95 billion in liquidity buffer relief. The central bank also projected a growth of 3.6 per cent for non-oil sectors.

Dubai has been strong in its preparations for Expo 2020 as growth and equilibriums as results of policy changes, technological implementation, and innovation in sustainability and infrastructure were widely noticed. The city anticipates a booming growth in sectors such as construction, tourism and hospitality, as well as looks to attract huge investments in real estate, environmental avenues and public affairs as a result of the expo.

Expo’s impact on Dubai’s economy

According to a statement from the Expo 2020 executive body, the total GDP will stand at Dh24.2 billion, while a report by Ernst & Young suggests Dubai’s economy will push up to about $33.4 billion as the country prepares to host millions of visitors despite the pandemic. Sectors such as events organisation, construction, and hospitality will contribute Dh68.9 billion, Dh27 billion and Dh11.4 billion, respectively.

A total investment of Dh40.1 billion will be put in in terms of infrastructure and capital as-sets. Event and legacy infrastructure will be allocated Dh53.5 billion.

Sustainability and technology have been highly incorporated for the Expo as the new Mohammed Bin Rashid Al Maktoum Solar Park will provide clean energy and facilitate charging stations for electric cars, and canopies will be covered with solar-panels with the ability to capture water from moisture and air around it, revolutionising sustainable energy sourcing.

Dubai, well-known to achieve the unthinkable, has taken up the challenge of making Expo 2020 the most digitally connected Expo in the history of the event. The latest technology and automation, such as AI and 5G, will play a major role in connecting the site via the Internet of Things. Data will be gathered and visualised via Navigator, a cloud-based energy management platform from Siemens.

The Red Line Dubai Metro has also been extended by 15 km from Jebel Ali Station as a convenient means to arriving at the Expo site. Infrastructure is an integral part of the economy as 301 individual projects worth $100 million are in their execution stage. The innovations in sustainability, technology and infrastructure will boost Dubai’s economic growth between 3.8 and 4.5 per cent over a span of five years, estimates suggest.

Dubai’s impeccable efforts

Expo 2020 will be a catalyst to boosting a broad spectrum of sectors in the name of innovation and development. It is not merely the preparations and the happening of the event itself, but especially the after-effects it will have a positive impact on the economy, with Expo 2020 rep-resenting a gateway to the world, putting Dubai on the world stage, facilitating the formation of business relationships, and attracting tourism and population increases in the long term.

Source: Khaleej Times

Congo Airways has inked a codeshare agreement with national carrier Kenya Airways (KQ) aimed at expanding their reach in the domestic, African and international routes.

The agreement, which was signed Thursday, will make it easy for the KQ customers to access Kinshasa directly from Nairobi as well as ply Africa and international routes jointly, the two airlines said.

A codeshare is a business deal between two or more airlines, which allows them to sell seats on each other’s flights and expand their network.

Each airline publishes and markets a flight under its designator and number as part of its schedule.

“The partnership agreement was signed by Kenya Airways Group CEO Allan Kilavuka and his Congo Airways counterpart Desire Balazire Bantu,” said a statement from State House, Nairobi, yesterday. The deal, signed in Kinshasa, on the last day of President Uhuru Kenyatta’s three-day state visit of Congo, will see the two national carriers also partner in aircraft maintenance.

The two carriers also agreed to collaborate on training and sharing of excess passengers, as well as cargo.

When it resumed international fights last year after a six-month hiatus on Covid-19 travel restrictions, KQ said it would not fly to Angola, Mali, the Republic of Congo, Somali, Sudan, Djibouti, Mozambique and Malawi.

The decision, said the airline, was an extremely difficult one in the current environment, pointing out that the move was necessary as they resumed operations gradually depending on passenger travel demand regionally and globally.

The airline’s net loss nearly tripled to Sh36.2 billion, the worst ever in the history of the airline, on account of Covid-19 disruptions that led to a sharp decline in passenger numbers.

The loss, for the financial year ended December 2020, is 2.8 times more than the Sh12.98 billion net loss it had posted a year earlier, and now deals a major blow to the recovery efforts of the national carrier.

Source: Business Daily

A slow roll-out of COVID-19 vaccination campaigns in Africa will limit the recovery of international travel across the continent, according to a report released by the International Air Transport Association (IATA) on Wednesday.

Africa, in comparison with other regions globally, has struggled in rolling out its vaccination campaign due to various factors causing it to lag behind in achieving targets of vaccinating its population.

The emergence of COVID-19 variants, especially from South Africa and the UK, has further complicated the lifting of travel restrictions within the continent and in other regions.

“With only 14% of the region’s RPKs (Revenue Passenger Kilometers) generated on domestic markets this will provide little cushion,” the report said, noting that domestic markets will improve faster than international travel.

“Relatively weak economic growth will also limit the extent of pent-up demand,” it added.

Demand and capacity across the continent in 2021 are also set to remain below the levels recorded in 2019.

Africa’s airline industry will also report losses this year due to the disruptions arising from the pandemic; however, they will be down from those incurred last year.

The sector is forecast to incur losses amounting to of $1.7 billion, or 24 percent of total revenues, compared to the 2020 figure of $2 billion, or 32 percent of total revenues, the report said.

Africa’s losses are predicted to be the lowest of the world’s six regions while Europe is expected to be the worst-hit with losses of up to $22.2 billion.

However, in terms of percentage of revenues, Africa’s losses are marginally the highest of all the regions with Europe second with 23.9 percent.

Africa’s aviation sector has been hard hit by the coronavirus pandemic with low demand for flights across the continent coupled with several cancellations and suspensions resulting in a huge drop in passenger revenue.

In light of the persisting effects of the pandemic, airlines and countries resorted to different measures in response to the fall in airline passenger revenue.

In particular, several airlines stepped up their cargo operations in an attempt to boost revenues and fight to avoid a total collapse.

IATA, in its report, noted this move saying a “historic high” increase of cargo revenues to $152 billion will strengthen a rise in industry revenues.

“In 2021 cargo will account for a third of industry revenues. This is significantly above cargo’s historic contribution, which ranged around 10-15% of total revenues. The improvement in cargo, however, is not able to offset the dramatic decline in passenger revenues.”

IATA said that in the face of the ongoing crisis, a number of immediate measures had to be implemented to prop up the industry. The key measure identified was plans being put in place for a restart in preparation for a recovery so as not to waste time once restrictions are fully lifted.

Air transport in Africa supports about 6.2 million jobs with Ethiopia the most reliant on it with more than 500,000 jobs followed by Tanzania (+336,000), Ghana (+284,000) and South Africa (+250,000).

Source: CGTN Africa

Kenyans traveling out of the country from 2022 will be required to have a vaccine passport, this is according to the country’s Cabinet Secretary for Tourism, Najib Balala.

The Government is in consultations with the International Air Transport Association (IATA), to create the vaccine passports.

“The reality is we’re going to get a vaccination passport. It’s like the former yellow fever vaccination card, so we will have a vaccination card for COVID-19, and probably one will need to be vaccinated every year.” Balala said.

The announcement was made during the launch of the vaccination drive of the hospitality and tourism sector to hoteliers, tour drivers, travel agents, restaurants foodservice and bars employees in KICC, Nairobi.

“COVID-19 vaccination is an important tool in curbing the effects of the pandemic, which will eventually help tourism rise again.” the ministry of tourism said.

The vaccination drive will begin in Nairobi for the next 10 days, and will then move to the other 4 counties within the one zone area (Machakos, Kiambu, Kajiado and Nakuru), and eventually vaccinate all the hospitality and tourism frontline workers in Kenya.

Source: CGTN Africa