Sharjah has successfully sounded out increased opportunities for doing business with Far East Asia following the participation of ‘Invest in Sharjah’ at two key summits.

An initiative of the Sharjah FDI Office, Invest in Sharjah took part in events in both South Korea and Shanghai to introduce businesspersons in two of Asia’s strongest economies to the emirate’s fertile investment landscape.

Invest in Sharjah’s trip, which took place from December 4th-8th, heavily promoted the emirate as being the perfect hub between east and west. High on the agenda at the events was how citizens from both South Korea and China can now receive a visa on arrival to the UAE, a decision that was announced in September this year and one taken to promote both tourism and business in the UAE.

Throughout the trip, the Invest in Sharjah representatives showcased the many benefits that investors could find in Sharjah, with a strategic special focus on the four key sectors of tourism and leisure, healthcare, transport and logistics and real estate and the environment.

The first port of call on Invest in Sharjah’s itinerary saw it travel to Seoul to highlight the array of advantages that Sharjah can offer Korean entrepreneurs who are considering setting up operations in the emirate. The organisation reiterated that South Korea was already a very important trading partner with the UAE, with bilateral trade between the two countries from 2010 to 2015 reaching AED122.7 billion, of which AED115.8 billion comprised the volume of imports from Korea and AED5.6 billion was UAE exports.

"We anticipate that Korean business interests will expand significantly in Sharjah based on our efforts to reveal its array of benefits and the new visa on arrival scheme, which we predict will hugely increase the current figure of 70,000 Koreans flying to the UAE each year. We expect that the Korean community in the UAE, which has already tripled in the past five years to reach 15,000 citizens, will grow significantly, with new businesses and investments fuelling this growth," said Mohammed Al Musharrkh, Director of the Sharjah FDI office.

Following its visit to Seoul, Invest in Sharjah travelled to Shanghai to attend the Free Trade and Special Economic Zone Summit Shanghai 2016, which took place in the world’s most populous city from December 7th-8th.