The beauty and environmental wealth of the UAE benefit citizens of the country. Although there are ongoing environmental challenges in the Emirate, there are also opportunities to protect and preserve the UAE’s rich natural heritage and safeguard the health and well-being of its citizens. The agencies and businesses working in the UAE have the best of intentions regarding environmental protection and have set up successful environmental programs to address many of the challenges. Emiratis are committed to their work and the missions of their organizations. This paper suggests a number of ways UAE can act to enhance its ability to protect its people and natural assets to ensure a more sustainable future. Strengthening communication about the state of the environment and impacts on the environment is a key principle, as is enhancing the legal and regulatory framework for environmental protection. UAE can also make commitments to support compliance and enforcement functions of the oversight agencies who work with the environment. In addition, UAE can upgrade the research function to support science-based decision making. Although many protected areas previously existed, Wadi Wurayah (in Fujairah Emirate) was declared in 2009 as the UAE’s first protected mountain area. In addition to deserts, forests, mountains and wetlands, the UAE is endowed with a long coastline featuring picturesque beaches and pristine mangroves. There are hundreds of islands along the coast, and shallow areas where seagrass and corals grow. Migratory and non-migratory birds flourish in the islands and shallow coastal areas. The environmental and natural resources of the UAE offer a tremendous benefit to society. The marine ecosystems and mangroves support the fishing trade and individuals who enjoy participating in recreational fishing, boating and water sports. The terrestrial ecosystems, oases and wadis support traditional pastimes such as falconry, as well as the livelihood of farmers. Residents and tourists enjoy kayaking in the mangroves and fishing, kite surfing, desert sports, hiking and other outdoor activities in natural areas. Many local citizens enjoy spending time outside because of their Emirati Bedouin heritage and their traditions of date and camel farming. His Highness Sheikh Zayed bin Sultan al Nayhan, the founder of the UAE, was a remarkable champion of the environment.

The Arab Gulf states all face increasing challenges in terms of sustainable consumption and production. These include: - Environmental sustainability issues such as waste, recycling, water usage, energy, including the use of renewables, and pollution - Economic sustainability issues including employment opportunities for local people, education and training and engagement of business and individuals that make up the supply chains - Social sustainability issues such as safety at work, working hours, equality and diversity, noise, dust and pollution, traffic congestion, stakeholder engagement and community involvement in decision-making While much of the previous research on this subject has been Western-centric, the present book includes contributions on these topics from specialists from the UAE, Bahrain, Lebanon, Egypt, Oman, Saudi Arabia, Morocco and Qatar as well as from the US and the UK.

The Middle East and North Africa region is well-known for its abundant natural resources and important geostrategic position. This position is often overshadowed by continued sectarian violence and trans-boundary conflicts that threaten the stability of the entire region with serious global implications. This preoccupation with conflict has come at the expense of addressing the region’s other challenges. Although the region’s fragile environmental state has increasingly preoccupied policymakers in individual countries, there is currently insufficient attention paid to coordinating collaborative action to recognise and address problems relating to its environmental sustainability and climatic change. In the absence of a positive agenda for tackling these issues, recurrent environmental setbacks and rapid depletion of the region’s natural resources continue to pose a major threat to the long-term economic, political, and social stability of the region. Despite the urgency of these challenges, there is little research dedicated to studying MENA’s environmental sustainability. Environmental Challenges in the MENA Region: The Long Road from Conflict to Cooperation draws from the proceedings of a seminal international conference on the subject at SOAS in October 2016, which was held as a celebration of the SOAS Centenary. This led to a collective contribution by experts and policy-makers concerned with the state of the MENA region’s environmental predicament with the aim of addressing these problems in a constructive and forward-looking approach. The chapters in this book are predicated upon two critical premises. First, expertise and awareness from a wide range of disciplines is required to understand and address environmental challenges. And, second, to have a real chance of success, MENA countries need to confront these problems as their common threats and to see them as an opportunity for regional cooperation and policy coordination. This book provides the results of an interdisciplinary effort to address the various dimensions of the region’s environmental challenges from across the region and disciplines.

2011 Updated Reprint. Updated Annually. United Arab Emirates Ecology & Nature Protection Laws and Regulation Handbook

The UAE¿s relatively open borders, economy, and society have won praise from advocates of expanded freedoms in the Middle East while producing financial excesses, social ills such as prostitution and human trafficking, and relatively lax controls on sensitive technologies acquired from the West. Contents of this report: (1) Governance, Human Rights, and Reform: Status of Political Reform; Human Rights-Related Issues; (2) Cooperation Against Terrorism and Proliferation; (3) Foreign Policy and Defense Cooperation With the U.S.: Regional Issues; Security Cooperation with the U.S.: Relations With Iran; Cooperation on Iraq; Cooperation on Afghanistan and Pakistan; U.S. and Other Arms Sales; UAE Provision of Foreign Aid; (4) Economic Issues.

This book contains the proceedings of the seventh in a series of biennial conferences on the topic of sustainable regional development that began in 2003. Organised by the Wessex Institute, the conference series provides a common forum for all scientists specialising in the range of subjects included within sustainable development and planning. In order to ensure that planning and development can meet our present needs without compromising future generations, planners, environmentalists, architects, engineers, policy makers, and economists must work together The use of modern technologies in planning gives us new potential to monitor and prevent environmental degradation. In recent years, in many countries an increase in spatial problems has led to planning crises. Planning problems are often associated with uneven development, deterioration of the quality of urban life, and destruction of the environment. The increasing urbanisation of the world, coupled with the global issues of environmental pollution, resource shortage, and economic restructuring, demand that we ensure a decent quality of life for our cities. Other environments, such as rural areas, forests, coastal regions, and mountains, face their own problems that urgently require solutions in order to avoid irreversible damage. Effective strategies for management should consider planning and regional development, two closely related disciplines, and emphasise the demand to handle these matters in an integrated way. The papers in the book cover such topics as: Regional Planning; City Planning; Sustainability and the Built Environment; Cultural Heritage; Environmental Management; Environmental Policies and Planning; Sustainable Tourism; Resources Management; Social and Political Issues; Rural Developments; Sustainable Solutions in Emerging Countries; Transportation; Energy Resources; Environmental Economics; Sustainable Assessment; Sustainable Development Indicators; Sustainability Modelling; Governance; Resilience; Community Planning; Planning for Equality; Quality of Life.