Driving from Amman to Jordan’s famous historic site of Petra was a dangerous escapade until the government fixed most of the tarmac in the past four years.
Encouraging tourism was a main goal behind repairing the potholes, hidden curves, sudden dips and broken pavement.
But the 4,000 to 5,000 hotel rooms in the Petra region have been mostly empty since the coronavirus struck. Jordan confirmed its first case in March last year.
“Jordan bet on tourism and lost,” said Raed Salem, an unemployed Jordanian chef who worked at a Petra hotel that closed last year.
A sharp decline in tourism since the pandemic has exposed imbalances in Jordan’s $43 billion economy.
It deepened socio-economic fissures in outlying tribal regions, traditionally a base of support for the monarchy.
Signs of economic depression abound in Wadi Musa, a valley surrounding Petra in the southern Maan governorate.
Tour guides say dozens of tourists a day come to see the ruins, compared with thousands before the pandemic.
The Nabatean city thrived on trade before surrendering to the Romans in the 2nd century AD.
Most restaurants are closed and unemployed young men sit idly on the side of Panorama Street overlooking the ruins.
The Marriott is one the few hotels still functioning. Its occupants are mostly Turkish engineers working on a nearby power project.
Mr Salem is broke and has a daughter in university. He is one of the 25 per cent of Jordanians who are officially unemployed.
He put his Toyota car up for sale to raise cash to support her. No buyers have come forward for months, although he dropped the price by a third to $4,000.
“We are finding out the hard way that tourism does not mean development,” Mr Salem said.
“The only ones left with income are bureaucrats in the agencies and departments the government had set up supposedly to promote tourism."
Visitors to Petra peaked at 1.1 million in 2019. One million of them were from outside the Arab Middle East.
Although Jordan lacks the openness and cultural links of Lebanon, instability in the Levant had boosted its image as one of the safest destinations in the region.
Only 1.2 million tourists visited Jordan last year compared with 5.4 million in 2019, according the Central Bank. The numbers include visits by Jordanians living abroad, whom the government also considers tourists - 392,000 last year and 1.5 million in 2019.
Tourism Minister Nayef Al Fayez expected the numbers to recover next year as world travel picked up.
“Tourism in Jordan suffered, reflecting on the economic sectors it supports,” Mr Al Fayez told a recent debate in Amman, organised by the Jordanian Centre for Defending Freedom of Journalists.
He said tourism income dropped to $1.4bn last year compared with $5.7bn in 2019.
“We started to see improvement last month but we do not want to exaggerate it,” Mr Al Fayez said, declining to give figures.
With hardly any tourists in Petra, donkey operators who made money by offering rides to tired visitors lost most of their income.
So did tour guides who were two years ago inundated with demand. Across Jordan, 60 per cent of travel agencies shut down, their union said.
More people in Wadi Musa are reportedly dependent on food aid from private charities. Poverty is widely believed to be the rise, in Wadi Musa and across the country.
“I know some people in the town who have no food,” said donkey owner Juma Bedoul. “It impacts the children hardest.”
The latest official figures made public, from 2010, showed that 14.4 per cent of Jordanians lived below the official poverty line of $63 a month.
Maan governorate at that time had the highest poverty rate in the country, at 26.6 per cent.
The issue is politically sensitive.
It featured in a royal dispute that broke into the open in March, between King Abdullah and Prince Hamzah bin Hussein, his younger half-brother.
The authorities suggested that the prince sought to agitate people against the king in tribal regions hit by recession in the last two years.
Ramzi Hamdan, a retired officer from Rajeh, a town next to Wadi Musa, said he was sceptical about the boom in international visitors to Petra before the coronavirus.
“It provided jobs but most workers were hired under the table and left without rights,” Mr Hamdan said. "Tourism needs rule of law."
During a less severe dip in tourism in the past decade, notable figures from Rajeh met to find solutions, Mr Hamdan said.
They used their connections in government to pipe underground public water to the area from nearby hills to boost agriculture.
“We have had something to fall back on in this crisis,” Mr Hamdan said, pointing to olive groves in Rajeh.
The region is mostly inhabited by tribes with historical links to inner Arabia, and many in Rajeh also work for the military, giving the town weight when dealing with the state.
Saudi Arabia paid 75 per cent of the $224 million it cost to fix the desert highway, Jordanian officials said at the inauguration of the project in 2017.
During a meeting in Amman last month, Prime Minister Bisher Al Khasawneh thanked Sultan Murshid, head of the Saudi Development Fund, for the financing.
Mr Al Khasawneh said the repairs "made a positive difference in the movement of people and goods on this vital highway".
The road is still pitch dark at night. Power shortages have kept most of its lights off.
Many drivers speed and state media has not abandoned the moniker “death road” for the desert highway.
But attracting tourists back after Covid-19 will take more than improved infrastructure, operators say.
Jordan is expensive, compared with Egypt and Turkey, and taxes are high, said Kamal Abu Thiab, head of the Jordanian Association of Tourism and Travel Agents.
Random enforcement of coronavirus rules have further pressured the largely bankrupt tourism sector, he said.
“Tourists are calculating more carefully where they will go. The coronavirus has lowered their incomes,” Mr Abu Thiab told Mr Al Fayez at the debate in Amman.
“We cannot go back to the old ways.”
Mica
Director: Ismael Ferroukhi
Stars: Zakaria Inan, Sabrina Ouazani
3 stars
The specs: 2018 Volkswagen Teramont
Price, base / as tested Dh137,000 / Dh189,950
Engine 3.6-litre V6
Gearbox Eight-speed automatic
Power 280hp @ 6,200rpm
Torque 360Nm @ 2,750rpm
Fuel economy, combined 11.7L / 100km
RESULTS
%3Cp%3E%0D5pm%3A%20Al%20Maha%20Stables%20%E2%80%93%20Maiden%20(PA)%20Dh80%2C000%20(Turf)%201%2C400m%0D%3Cbr%3EWinner%3A%20AF%20Alfahem%2C%20Tadhg%20O%E2%80%99Shea%20(jockey)%2C%20Ernst%20Oetrel%20(trainer)%0D%3Cbr%3E5.30pm%3A%20Al%20Anoud%20Stables%20%E2%80%93%20Handicap%20(PA)%20Dh80%2C000%20(T)%201%2C200m%0D%3Cbr%3EWinner%3A%20AF%20Musannef%2C%20Tadhg%20O%E2%80%99Shea%2C%20Ernst%20Oertel%0D%3Cbr%3E6pm%3A%20Wathba%20Stallions%20Cup%20%E2%80%93%20Handicap%20(PA)%20Dh70%2C000%20(T)%201%2C400m%0D%3Cbr%3EWinner%3A%20AF%20Rasam%2C%20Tadhg%20O%E2%80%99Shea%2C%20Ernst%20Oertel%0D%3Cbr%3E6.30pm%3A%20Arabian%20Triple%20Crown%20Round%202%20%E2%80%93%20Group%203%20(PA)%20Dh%20300%2C000%20(T)%202%2C200m%0D%3Cbr%3EWinner%3A%20Joe%20Star%2C%20Tadhg%20O%E2%80%99Shea%2C%20Helal%20Al%20Alawi%0D%3Cbr%3E7pm%3A%20Liwa%20Oasis%20%E2%80%93%20Group%202%20(PA)%20Dh300%2C000%20(T)%201%2C400m%0D%3Cbr%3EWinner%3A%20AF%20Alajaj%2C%20Tadhg%20O%E2%80%99Shea%2C%20Ernst%20Oertel%0D%3Cbr%3E7.30pm%3A%20Dames%20Stables%20%E2%80%93%20Handicap%20(TB)%20Dh80%2C000%20(T)%201%2C400m%0D%3Cbr%3EWinner%3A%20Silent%20Defense%2C%20Oscar%20Chavez%2C%20Rashed%20Bouresly%3C%2Fp%3E%0A
Aayan%E2%80%99s%20records
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Most sought after workplace benefits in the UAE
- Flexible work arrangements
- Pension support
- Mental well-being assistance
- Insurance coverage for optical, dental, alternative medicine, cancer screening
- Financial well-being incentives
UAE cricketers abroad
Sid Jhurani is not the first cricketer from the UAE to go to the UK to try his luck.
Rameez Shahzad Played alongside Ben Stokes and Liam Plunkett in Durham while he was studying there. He also played club cricket as an overseas professional, but his time in the UK stunted his UAE career. The batsman went a decade without playing for the national team.
Yodhin Punja The seam bowler was named in the UAE’s extended World Cup squad in 2015 despite being just 15 at the time. He made his senior UAE debut aged 16, and subsequently took up a scholarship at Claremont High School in the south of England.
Tips for job-seekers
- Do not submit your application through the Easy Apply button on LinkedIn. Employers receive between 600 and 800 replies for each job advert on the platform. If you are the right fit for a job, connect to a relevant person in the company on LinkedIn and send them a direct message.
- Make sure you are an exact fit for the job advertised. If you are an HR manager with five years’ experience in retail and the job requires a similar candidate with five years’ experience in consumer, you should apply. But if you have no experience in HR, do not apply for the job.
David Mackenzie, founder of recruitment agency Mackenzie Jones Middle East
The Vile
Starring: Bdoor Mohammad, Jasem Alkharraz, Iman Tarik, Sarah Taibah
Director: Majid Al Ansari
Rating: 4/5
Results
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The%20specs%20
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Mercer, the investment consulting arm of US services company Marsh & McLennan, expects its wealth division to at least double its assets under management (AUM) in the Middle East as wealth in the region continues to grow despite economic headwinds, a company official said.
Mercer Wealth, which globally has $160 billion in AUM, plans to boost its AUM in the region to $2-$3bn in the next 2-3 years from the present $1bn, said Yasir AbuShaban, a Dubai-based principal with Mercer Wealth.
“Within the next two to three years, we are looking at reaching $2 to $3 billion as a conservative estimate and we do see an opportunity to do so,” said Mr AbuShaban.
Mercer does not directly make investments, but allocates clients’ money they have discretion to, to professional asset managers. They also provide advice to clients.
“We have buying power. We can negotiate on their (client’s) behalf with asset managers to provide them lower fees than they otherwise would have to get on their own,” he added.
Mercer Wealth’s clients include sovereign wealth funds, family offices, and insurance companies among others.
From its office in Dubai, Mercer also looks after Africa, India and Turkey, where they also see opportunity for growth.
Wealth creation in Middle East and Africa (MEA) grew 8.5 per cent to $8.1 trillion last year from $7.5tn in 2015, higher than last year’s global average of 6 per cent and the second-highest growth in a region after Asia-Pacific which grew 9.9 per cent, according to consultancy Boston Consulting Group (BCG). In the region, where wealth grew just 1.9 per cent in 2015 compared with 2014, a pickup in oil prices has helped in wealth generation.
BCG is forecasting MEA wealth will rise to $12tn by 2021, growing at an annual average of 8 per cent.
Drivers of wealth generation in the region will be split evenly between new wealth creation and growth of performance of existing assets, according to BCG.
Another general trend in the region is clients’ looking for a comprehensive approach to investing, according to Mr AbuShaban.
“Institutional investors or some of the families are seeing a slowdown in the available capital they have to invest and in that sense they are looking at optimizing the way they manage their portfolios and making sure they are not investing haphazardly and different parts of their investment are working together,” said Mr AbuShaban.
Some clients also have a higher appetite for risk, given the low interest-rate environment that does not provide enough yield for some institutional investors. These clients are keen to invest in illiquid assets, such as private equity and infrastructure.
“What we have seen is a desire for higher returns in what has been a low-return environment specifically in various fixed income or bonds,” he said.
“In this environment, we have seen a de facto increase in the risk that clients are taking in things like illiquid investments, private equity investments, infrastructure and private debt, those kind of investments were higher illiquidity results in incrementally higher returns.”
The Abu Dhabi Investment Authority, one of the largest sovereign wealth funds, said in its 2016 report that has gradually increased its exposure in direct private equity and private credit transactions, mainly in Asian markets and especially in China and India. The authority’s private equity department focused on structured equities owing to “their defensive characteristics.”
First Person
Richard Flanagan
Chatto & Windus
Lampedusa: Gateway to Europe
Pietro Bartolo and Lidia Tilotta
Quercus
Key findings of Jenkins report
- Founder of the Muslim Brotherhood, Hassan al Banna, "accepted the political utility of violence"
- Views of key Muslim Brotherhood ideologue, Sayyid Qutb, have “consistently been understood” as permitting “the use of extreme violence in the pursuit of the perfect Islamic society” and “never been institutionally disowned” by the movement.
- Muslim Brotherhood at all levels has repeatedly defended Hamas attacks against Israel, including the use of suicide bombers and the killing of civilians.
- Laying out the report in the House of Commons, David Cameron told MPs: "The main findings of the review support the conclusion that membership of, association with, or influence by the Muslim Brotherhood should be considered as a possible indicator of extremism."
Wenger's Arsenal reign in numbers
1,228 - games at the helm, ahead of Sunday's Premier League fixture against West Ham United.
704 - wins to date as Arsenal manager.
3 - Premier League title wins, the last during an unbeaten Invincibles campaign of 2003/04.
1,549 - goals scored in Premier League matches by Wenger's teams.
10 - major trophies won.
473 - Premier League victories.
7 - FA Cup triumphs, with three of those having come the last four seasons.
151 - Premier League losses.
21 - full seasons in charge.
49 - games unbeaten in the Premier League from May 2003 to October 2004.
Racecard
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The National Archives, Abu Dhabi
Founded over 50 years ago, the National Archives collects valuable historical material relating to the UAE, and is the oldest and richest archive relating to the Arabian Gulf.
Much of the material can be viewed on line at the Arabian Gulf Digital Archive - https://www.agda.ae/en
Dubai Bling season three
Cast: Loujain Adada, Zeina Khoury, Farhana Bodi, Ebraheem Al Samadi, Mona Kattan, and couples Safa & Fahad Siddiqui and DJ Bliss & Danya Mohammed
Rating: 1/5
THE BIO
Favourite book: ‘Purpose Driven Life’ by Rick Warren
Favourite travel destination: Switzerland
Hobbies: Travelling and following motivational speeches and speakers
Favourite place in UAE: Dubai Museum
Slow loris biog
From: Lonely Loris is a Sunda slow loris, one of nine species of the animal native to Indonesia, Malaysia, Thailand and Singapore
Status: Critically endangered, and listed as vulnerable on the International Union for Conservation of Nature red list due to growing demand in the global exotic pet trade. It is one of the most popular primate species found at Indonesian pet markets
Likes: Sleeping, which they do for up to 18 hours a day. When they are awake, they like to eat fruit, insects, small birds and reptiles and some types of vegetation
Dislikes: Sunlight. Being a nocturnal animal, the slow loris wakes around sunset and is active throughout the night
Superpowers: His dangerous elbows. The slow loris’s doe eyes may make it look cute, but it is also deadly. The only known venomous primate, it hisses and clasps its paws and can produce a venom from its elbow that can cause anaphylactic shock and even death in humans
THE BIO
Favourite car: Koenigsegg Agera RS or Renault Trezor concept car.
Favourite book: I Am Pilgrim by Terry Hayes or Red Notice by Bill Browder.
Biggest inspiration: My husband Nik. He really got me through a lot with his positivity.
Favourite holiday destination: Being at home in Australia, as I travel all over the world for work. It’s great to just hang out with my husband and family.
UAE currency: the story behind the money in your pockets
Cultural fiesta
What: The Al Burda Festival
When: November 14 (from 10am)
Where: Warehouse421, Abu Dhabi
The Al Burda Festival is a celebration of Islamic art and culture, featuring talks, performances and exhibitions. Organised by the Ministry of Culture and Knowledge Development, this one-day event opens with a session on the future of Islamic art. With this in mind, it is followed by a number of workshops and “masterclass” sessions in everything from calligraphy and typography to geometry and the origins of Islamic design. There will also be discussions on subjects including ‘Who is the Audience for Islamic Art?’ and ‘New Markets for Islamic Design.’ A live performance from Kuwaiti guitarist Yousif Yaseen should be one of the highlights of the day.
COMPANY%20PROFILE
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