UAE: Hamriyah Free Zone Authority Launches Sharjah Food Park

Hamriyah Free Zone Authority has launched ‘Sharjah Food Park’, a regional hub for the Middle East and North Africa’s multi-billion dollar food industry, dedicated to food import, export, storage, manufacture and packaging.

The new world class zone will be the region’s largest dedicated facility for food industries, covering a total area of 11 million square metres (118 million square feet), and offering warehousing, office space and labour accommodation.

Established in 1995, Hamriyah Free Zone is Sharjah’s largest free zone and the second largest industrial hub in the UAE.

The free zone houses over 6,500 enterprises from 157 countries, attracting foreign investment from more than 500 industry verticals in the key sectors such as oil and gas, petrochemicals, maritime, steel, construction and food products.

The free zone allows 100 percent foreign ownership, exemption from commercial levies, repatriation of capital and profit, no corporation or income tax and no import or export tax.

Hamriyah Free Zone is strategically located adjacent to Hamriyah deep water port, near the centre of Sharjah city, and close to Port Khalid.

The free zone has excellent road, sea and air connections, just 30 minutes drive from Sharjah International Airport, 40 minutes from Dubai International Airport and two hours drive to Sharjah’s east-coast port of Khor Fakkan.

Freight services transport food products from Sharjah to Africa, Asia, Eastern Europe, across the Middle East and further afield.

The Hamriyah Free Zone Authority is also now able to process licensing formalities for new tenants in less than two-hours. Licenses can be issued for commercial, industrial or service purposes following a simple three-step application process.

Commercial licenses can be issued for general trading or for specific trading in up to five activities, while industrial licenses can cover processing, assembly, packaging and manufacturing activities.

Service licenses can be issued for a number of activities and consultancy services.

The new Sharjah Food Park business centre will include a 100 executive office suites of between 15 square metres and 42 square metres in size.

Five different office lease packages will be available starting from AED 11,000 (US$ 2,998) through to AED 35,000 (US$ 9,537). Offices are equipped with the latest communication and internet facilities.

UAE: Air India To Fly More Routes To Sharjah

Air India Express, the Kochi-headquartered budget arm of Air India, is expected to add two new routes to Sharjah International Airport next month, bringing the total number of its routes between Sharjah and Indian destinations up to seven. The airline will introduce three non-stop flights per week each from Chandigarh (IXC), the state capital of Punjab and Haryana, and from Tiruchirapalli (TRZ) in Tamil Nadu state.

India is one of the United Arab Emirates’ leading trade partners, accounting for some 9.8 percent of the country’s total non-oil trade, buying 14.9 percent of the Emirates’ exports and 8.7 percent of its re-exports. The total volume of bilateral trade between India and the UAE is expected to increase from USD 60 billion in 2014 to USD 100 billion by the year 2020. India is also the largest single origin of investors for Sharjah’s Hamriyah Free Zone and Sharjah International Airport Free Zone (SAIF Zone).

Air India Express has been expanding its services to destinations in the UAE, including daily Mumbai-Dubai, Mumbai-Sharjah, New Delhi-Dubai and New Delhi-Abu Dhabi routes, which it added earlier this year. According to the airline, the number of its weekly flights between India and the UAE increased from 107 flights to 146 flights per week before the summer.

The low-cost airline currently operates five routes with a total of 15 weekly flights to Sharjah International Airport. Air India Express now flies direct to Sharjah from Kochi (COK), Kozhikode (CCJ), Mumbai (SAHAR), New Delhi (DEL), Thiruvananthapuram (TRV) and Varanasi (VNS)).

India is well connected to Sharjah, with Sharjah-headquartered Air Arabia operating flights between Sharjah and 13 Indian destinations. Jet Airways, India’s second largest airline, operates direct daily flights on Sharjah-Kochi and Sharjah-Mangaluru (IXE) routes.

Passenger numbers at Sharjah International Airport increased by 11.55 percent during the first half of this year, compared with the same period in 2015, with a total of 5.35 million passengers passed through the airport from January to June 2016. According to Sharjah Airport Authority statistics, the number of passengers passing through the airport increased by nearly 15 percent last month, compared to July 2015.

Air India Express Makes More Routes To Sharjah

Air India Express, the Kochi-headquartered budget arm of Air India, is expected to add two new routes to Sharjah International Airport next month, bringing the total number of its routes between Sharjah and Indian destinations up to seven. The airline will introduce three non-stop flights per week each from Chandigarh (IXC), the state capital of Punjab and Haryana, and from Tiruchirapalli (TRZ) in Tamil Nadu state.

India is one of the United Arab Emirates’ leading trade partners, accounting for some 9.8 percent of the country’s total non-oil trade, buying 14.9 percent of the Emirates’ exports and 8.7 percent of its re-exports. The total volume of bilateral trade between India and the UAE is expected to increase from USD 60 billion in 2014 to USD 100 billion by the year 2020. India is also the largest single origin of investors for Sharjah’s Hamriyah Free Zone and Sharjah International Airport Free Zone (SAIF Zone).

Air India Express has been expanding its services to destinations in the UAE, including daily Mumbai-Dubai, Mumbai-Sharjah, New Delhi-Dubai and New Delhi-Abu Dhabi routes, which it added earlier this year. According to the airline, the number of its weekly flights between India and the UAE increased from 107 flights to 146 flights per week before the summer.

The low-cost airline currently operates five routes with a total of 15 weekly flights to Sharjah International Airport. Air India Express now flies direct to Sharjah from Kochi (COK), Kozhikode (CCJ), Mumbai (SAHAR), New Delhi (DEL), Thiruvananthapuram (TRV) and Varanasi.

India is well connected to Sharjah, with Sharjah-headquartered Air Arabia operating flights between Sharjah and 13 Indian destinations. Jet Airways, India’s second largest airline, operates direct daily flights on Sharjah-Kochi and Sharjah-Mangaluru routes.

Passenger numbers at Sharjah International Airport increased by 11.55 percent during the first half of this year, compared with the same period in 2015, with a total of 5.35 million passengers passed through the airport from January to June 2016. According to Sharjah Airport Authority statistics, the number of passengers passing through the airport increased by nearly 15 percent last month, compared to July 2015.

INDIA: Jet Airways to launch daily Mangalore-Sharjah flights

Jet Airways, India’s premier international airline, has announced that it will launch a new daily route from Mangaluru (Mangalore) in southern India to Sharjah in the UAE from 7 August 2016. Mangaluru is the main port city of Karnataka, India’s twelfth largest state by population.

Jet Airways is India’s second largest airline operating flights to 73 destinations, including 22 international flights and 51 domestic flights. Beginning in August, the Indian carrier will fly daily from Mangaluru at 9.30am, arriving in Sharjah International Airport at 11.45am local time. Return flights will leave Sharjah at 12.45pm and reach Mangaluru at 5.55pm. Jet already operates daily direct flights from Kochi in the Indian state of Kerala to Sharjah.

India is well connected to Sharjah, with international low cost airline Air India Express operating flights to the emirate from six Indian destinations and Sharjah-headquartered Air Arabia operating flights between Sharjah and 13 key Indian destinations.

The UAE is a popular business and tourism destination for India, which currently ranks as the Emirates’ third largest trade partner after China and the USA. Indian investment in the UAE is estimated at about US$ 52 billion (AED 190b), with India being the largest single origin of investors for Sharjah’s Hamriyah Free Zone and Sharjah International Airport Free Zone (SAIF Zone). SAIF Zone organised an extensive marketing roadshow in India over the early part of this year to target Indian investors.

Sharjah International Airport, registered a 12 percent increase in overall passenger traffic during the first three months of 2016, with a record 2.7 million passengers being handled by the airport, compared with 2.4 million during the first quarter of 2015. Total passenger numbers passing through Sharjah airport topped 10 million for the first time during 2015.