UAE is currently importing 80 per cent of its food supplies, however, the country aims to produce 60 per cent more food as the global population is expected to reach 9 billion people within the next 33 years. To achieve this goal, the UAE is seeking new technologies that can be accommodated in its harsh weather conditions to produce local crops that need the with least amount of water.
As part of this objectiove, Mawarid Holding signed an agreement with Chinese Chongqing Earthskin Eco-technology to implement desert soilisation technologies in different parts of the Al Ain desert.
Under the agreement, both parties will test different technologies in one or more sites from the existing desert to plant 10 square kilometres of grass, trees or vegetables in the first year of cooperation.
In a different private project, another team of Chinese scientists have already started harvesting rice in diluted sea-water with the aim of covering around 10 per cent of the UAE with rice fields. An agreement was also signed to promote seawater rice across the Arab world to reduce the risk of food shortage in the future.