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”Provide me with sustainable agriculture,
i will ensure you a civilized society”
His Highness The Late Sheikh Zayed bin
Sultan Al Nahyan
His Highness Sheikh Khalifa Bin Zayed Al
Nahyyan, gives agriculture in general and
date palms in particular huge care and put
it on the top of his priorities. This
Generous auspice comes as a continuation of
the philanthropic demarche established by
His Highness the late Sheikh Zayed bin
Sultan Al Nahyan (may God rest his soul).
This special attention of His Highness, The
President, is clearly demonstrated in the
increasing efforts exerted to improve Date
Palm plantations all around the Emirates in
terms of quantity, quality, productivity and
the exploitation of available resources,
which led to the leading position in the
Date Palm business worldwide that the
country is enjoying nowadays where the
actual date tree population in U.A.E. is
about 40 millions, of which 8.5 in AL-AIN
region.
The United Arab Emirates (U.A.E.),
proclaimed on 2 December 1971, is set up of
seven Emirates with Abu Dhabi the capital of
the State. U.A.E., with a total land area of
83,600 km˛ (including approximately 200
islands) is inhabited by 2.443 million.
Climatically, the country is divided into
two ecological zones, which greatly
influence the agricultural production: These
are the coastal region with hot and humid
summers and warm winters, and the inland
region, which is dryer.
The potentialities of a commercial date
production industry in U.A.E. were realized
many years ago. This fact is evidences by
the recent planting of several million date
trees to reach the level of above 40 million
date palm tress.
The annual date production in U.A.E. has
jumped from less than 8,000 metric tones
(MT) in 1971 to more than 240,000 MT in
1995, an increase of about 30 fold. The date
fruit import had consequently dropped from
100,000 MT (1989) to 12,000 MT (1994). The
decline corresponds with an increase in the
country’s production of 100,000 MT over the
same period. The export of dates had also
jumped from zero (0) in 1971 to above 50,000
MT in 1998 with a value of US$ 15 million.
The U.A.E. date harvested area has increased
from less than 60 hectares (ha) in 1971 to
31,005 ha in 1996. This increase in area is
about 48 times and allowed the country to be
internationally classified as the Seventh
major producing country with six percent of
the world date production. This date palm
area constitutes 15% of the total cultivated
land (about 200,000 ha).
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