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Building on the success of the last year edition, the organizing committee of Emirates International Date Palm Festival have decided to double the size of the show this year, scheduled to take place November 21 -26, 2011. Spreading over an area of three exhibition halls at the Abu Dhabi National Exhibition Centre, the festival will showcase the product offerings of 200 exhibitors from 17 countries, contributing to the cultural and commercial development of dates.
The festival will be held under the patronage of His Highness Sheikh Mansour Bin Zayed Al-Nayhan, Deputy Prime Minister of the UAE, Minister of Presidential Affairs and Chairman of the Abu Dhabi Food Control Authority, and is organised by Turret Media.
Mohamed Jalal Al Reyaysa, Chairman of the Higher Organizing Committee for the festival, said: "We anticipate wider popular interest for this round of the festival. Our anticipation springs from the popularity the festival achieved in the last round and from the wide variety of events planned this year. This is also an occasion for exchange of views and expertise among producers, experts and specialists of date palm as well as among top officials from the date’s industry."
“This substantial increase in size is due to the huge demand and overwhelming response received by the international and regional dates manufacturers. They are confident that their participation will tap the dynamic and potentially enormous emerging dates markets; and will also make brisk business during the six days of the event,” said Qaboos Khalid, Project Director of the Festival.
In 2010, the amount of dates sold to individuals, buyers and companies during the festival exceeded AED18.4 million. More than 90% of the dates manufacturing companies participating last year have returned for this year’s edition. Top exhibitors include: Al Foah Company, Al Dahra Agriculture, Al Ain Diary, Onaizah Dates Factory and Al Madinah Dates.
“The hallmark hosted buyer programme maximizes the sales potential for the companies by bringing in 50 international dates buyers and arranging one-to-one meetings with them in a very structured and highly effective way,” Khalid added.
Nael Khalil, Chief Operating Officer, Al Dahra Agriculture - the Diamond Sponsor of the festival said: “The festival is a great opportunity to network with like-minded people in the date’s industry and show them our products range. Our participation has been successful as we receive a lot of queries about our products from the international date buyers.”
Al Ain Dairy, a leading producer of fluid milk and other dairy products in the Middle East, is back with even bigger participation this year. Shashi Kumar, Chief Operating Officer, Al Ain Dairy, commented that, “We enjoyed the varied footfall from schools, institutions and families last year. It was a very interesting experience where many people were sampling our brand for camel milk for the first time. The visitors were educated on the fact that nutritional value of dates is optimised through the addition of camel milk.”
The organizing committee has also confirmed participation from foreign countries this year, which includes China, Italy, Belgium and USA. The festival will also host national pavilion from Iran for the first time, together with pavilions from Jordan, Saudi Arabia, Morocco and Iraq.
Amer Merhi, Area Sales Manager for Middle East, Africa and India region at Cavalier - an international company specialized in manufacturing Belgian Chocolate with no added sugar – said: “It is the perfect starting point for us to enhance our brand awareness by offering healthy products, which do not compromise on taste, to the local and expats society in the UAE.”
Researchers, farming technology, as well as agriculture and other governmental representatives are also present in the exhibition to highlight their achievements and reach out to communities.
A wide range of activities and traditional features involving the nation’s favourite super-fruit have been planned in the ambit of the festival, such as date palm tree climbing, tribal singing, dancing and poetry, dates photography including dates cooking, dates tasting and even dates theatre performed by school children. Over 17000 visitors are expected to visit the exhibition.
“We are delighted to confirm that the success of the event has clearly been met with praise from the Abu Dhabi Government and we are determined to provide additional opportunities for dates’ market growth in food services sector at international level,” Khalid said.
Co-located with SIAL Middle East, the regional trade show for food industry, participants at Emirates International Date Pam Festival will benefit from the already established high quality audience.
The festival will take place from November 21 to 26, 2011.
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