UAE Business Forum

I didn’t want to be late that’s why I allotted 45 minutes traveling time to Makati Shangrila for the Philippines-UAE Business Forum. There’s a group of businessmen from UAE looking for investment opportunities in our country. DTI invited the industry leaders to meet with them.

I was relieved to have found my name tag. You cannot be a gate crasher kasi all seats were reserved.

Aisel Anolin at the DTI (Dept of Trade and Industry) registration counter

Table assignment for Philippine businessmen

Table assignment for UAE delegates

Table assignment for Philippine government representatives

The UAE national anthem was played after our own Lupang Hinirang.

DTI Secretary Gregory Domingo

The UAE delegation consists of high level government officials and businessmen. The companies represented were mostly the biggest in UAE and top ten in the world.

Minister Sultan Bin Saeed Al-Mansouri

They are looking for businesses, products, they could either buy, invest, promote, partner with.
Jollibee is one company that signed a joint venture to put-up outlets in the region.

Found my seat.

We’ve bee requested to be seated by 10 am. Wala pa sila?

Haba naman nitong name tag. The person has to look down at my midsection to see my name. lalo ng nahalata ang tyan ko. I’ll shorten the string.

Ang ikli naman, para akong bibigtiin.

Program

Where are you guys?

Angel Ngu, Executive Vice President, Federation of Filipino-Chinese Chmabers of Commerce and Industry with Abdullah Saif, Senior Manager for Sales for Southeast Asia, Dubai Aluminum (Emirates Global Aluminum)

Jesus Pineda, Jr. , Vice Chairman, Philippines, Inc.

Melesa “Elsie” Chua with Dr. Hayat Hassan Alhosani, Journalist from UAE covering the delegation’s activities. Elsie has offices in the Middle East. According to her, she was roughed up at the Dubai International Airport 5 years ago. The immigration officers mistook her for a domestic helper.

UAE population is 8 million. 64M tourists visited their country last year. They expect 80 millions visitors by 2015. There are half a million Filipinos working in Abu Dhabi contributing to their economy.
They have zero organized crime. They pay no income tax.
They are now the number one shopping destination in the world beating New York, Paris and London. They have over 70 shopping malls with the Dubai Mall as the biggest.

I noticed this Beagle stationed at the hotel’s side entrance. Aside from Belgian Malinoise, they use Beagle na rin kasi mas mura daw and they have excellent sense of smell.