Covid-19 impact: UAE may see V- and U-shaped recovery

Dubai - The Ministry of Infrastructure Development is managing over 100 projects worth around Dh20 billion which are in the development stage.

 UAE's economy will probably see a combination of V- and U-shaped recovery following the impact of coronavirus pandemic, Abdullah Al Nuaimi, UAE's Minister for Infrastructure Development, said on Thursday.
"My guess is it would be a combination of V- and U-shaped recovery. This pandemic is a worldwide issue and for the economy to get back (onto the track), the whole world has to recover. Now we have seen recovery in many countries. We also have seen similar things in UAE where more coronavirus cases are recovering and that is a good sign for us," Al Nuaimi said while talking to Bloomberg TV.
As the coronavirus cases in the country are on the decline and some of the key sectors have also been opened to some extent, the UAE Central Bank on Wednesday said it expects economic recovery to begin in the second-half of this year.
"While recovery of economic activity is projected to commence in the second half of the year, recovery of economic sentiment will hinge on deploying policy support measures. The Targeted Economic Support Scheme (TESS) by CBUAE and the economic stimulus packages announced by both local and federal governments are likely to weigh in positively on the Purchasing Managers' Index, real estate prices, employment and credit growth with a positive impact on the overall sentiment once the virus risks are under control," the apex bank said in its first-quarter 2020 report released on Wednesday.
New major UAE road
The Ministry of Infrastructure Development is managing over 100 projects worth around Dh20 billion which are in the development stage.
"Our projects have not been hampered while most projects in the world are affected by the pandemic. We have allocated Dh7 billion for the housing scheme in Ras Al Khaimah. So we have over Dh20 billion worth of projects together that are being managed by the ministry," he said.
The minister, however, said there could be some delays but otherwise the projects are going fine.
"There are a couple of project that we should continue concentrating on. One of them is a housing scheme in Ras Al Khaimah. There are over 2,000 villas for nationals in the scheme and 1,000 of them are under construction. Another project is highway that is connecting north and west (of the country) and that project is almost at the end of duration," he added.
- waheedabbas@khaleejtimes.com