FDI Free Zones of The Year 2021

The global economy has suffered a lot since the outbreak of the pandemic. In fact, it upturned the world economy. But the DMCC was lucky enough to have not only survived the situation but has maintained the position as the best free zone in the world, winning the ‘’Global Free Zone of the Year’’ title for the 7th consecutive time in 2021.

The jury consisted of 6 FDI judges, four external and two judges, and there were 70 zones in the contest.

Because of the pandemic the free zones have been facing monumental challenges, across the globe, but most of them were quite resilient to withstand the impact of the situation while maintaining their commitment to their vision.

Although the DMCC hit the mark, but few others were noticeable as well amid the various hindrances of the past one and a half year. The second position was secured by Mauritius Freeport, because of its exemplary performance, while the China’s Waigaoqiao and the Dalian Free Zones stand on third and fourth positions, owing to their good performance.

The Polish SEZs also stood prominent alongside the Katowice SEZ ranking fifth and the L Lòdz SEZ at the sixth position. The others on the top ten list were the four up-coming zones, the United Arab Emirates’ Ajman Free Zone standing at the seventh position, Moscow’s Kaliningrad SEZ on eighth, Costa Rica’s Coyol Free Zone at ninth and the west of London zone at the tenth position.

Because of the covid-19 pandemic, the past 1 and a half years have been very difficult in modern history for every country. Although the pandemic was a health crisis, it has hindered trade and investments all over the world, consuming public resources, since billions were spent by the governments to contain the infection and in social welfare management, affecting the budgets for the growth of free zones initiatives.

The FDI Markets figures show a sharp drop in capital investment in 2020 during Jan and July 2021. In other terms, even though the number of FDI projects in various economic zones continues to be below pre-pandemic levels, the capital expenditure is still increasing.

For the zones that evolved and adjusted to the new situation, the SEZ programmes are faced with new challenges that lie ahead in the changing economic world.

Depending on the outlook, these challenges can become opportunities for some SEZ programs by giving a new momentum. Recently the UK has joined the group, after breaking from the Eurpean Union, by announcing a new freepost program and has assigned 8 locations with freeport authorization. Zones from LAC are also getting support from the US sponsored programs.

The FDI’s Global Free Zones of the Year 2021 sheds light on some of the best performing free zones of the world. They also indicate the direction towards success for all free zones, defining a benchmark for those who want to emerge stronger from the last couple of years struck economies.

DMCC is gaining significantly as a result of winning Global Free Zone of the Year 2021 award and a huge number of SMEs around the world are setting up businesses in DMCC which will not only support DMCC authority, but also the entire support industry such as law firms, dmcc auditors, company setup consultants, engineering consultants, crypto companies, etc.