Sharjah Update Sharjah business & Investment News from Invest in Sharjah (Sharjah FDI Office)
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Abu Dhabi, Dubai, Ras Al Khaimah and Sharjah were listed among the world’s top cities in ‘Economic Potential’ by the 2014/2015 Global Cities of the Future report produced by fDI intelligence, a division of the Financial Times (FT) specialising in foreign direct investment. Abu Dhabi and Dubai were listed in the report’s overall Top 25 cities list, while Sharjah and Ras Al Khaimah were listed in the overall Top 10 small and mid-sized cities.
Dubai was listed as the world’s top city for ‘FDI Strategy’ and ranked third in terms of ‘Economic Potential’, with UAE capital Abu Dhabi ranking as sixth in Economic Potential overall and first in Economic Potential among ‘Large Cities’ listed in the report.
Sharjah city was ranked in the report’s top ten small and mid-sized cities lists for Economic Potential, Human Capital and Lifestyle, Cost Effectiveness, Connectivity and Business Friendliness. Other countries in the small and mid-sized cities lists included Zurich, Geneva and Edinburgh.
fDI intelligence created the shortlist for the Global Cities of the Future using data collected via its specialist online tools fDi Markets and fDi Benchmark. The list of 130 locations considered by the report was drawn up to include the top 100 locations in terms of inward FDI projects, plus any additional locations in the top 15 identified for each region, not already included in the original list of 100 locations.
Data was then collected for locations in the report’s shortlist under five categories: Economic Potential, Business Friendliness, Human Capital and Lifestyle, Cost Effectiveness and Connectivity. Cities in the study were then categorised according to population.
Sharjah is currently one of the fastest growing economies in the Middle East with an estimated 13% GDP growth in 2014 (according to Sharjah Chamber of Commerce and Industry). Global credit rating agency Standard & Poor’s, which recently rated the Emirate of Sharjah as A/A-1 over long- and short-term, expects the emirate’s nominal economic growth to remain strong, averaging about 8% in 2014-2017.
Source: Global Cities of the Future 2014/2015 report
