13 Dec 2023
By Richard Muir, Deputy Chief Executive of Glasgow Chamber of Commerce
It has been a successful year for the Glasgow Chamber and its work in international trade culminating in us leading a trade delegation from Glasgow to Dubai’s Expo site for COP28 just last week.
Eight Scottish businesses, in partnership with Glasgow City Council, from a variety of sectors all arrived keen to gain valuable new contacts, up to date insights and promote their work and ideas on key topics of sustainability and climate to potential investors and other sustainable businesses and leaders.
Our mission was probably the finest example of a genuine collective collaboration that I can remember of Glasgow utilising its global links. We linked up with teams at BritCham Abu Dhabi and BBG Dubai both of which have impressive memberships, connections and leaders such as the highly respected Nick Cochrane-Dyet MBE.
12 international Chambers took part with 116 delegates from 66 companies participating in a packed 3-day programme. Crucially we all left the conference with a clear desire to continue to work with our partners in the UAE on an ongoing basis after COP.
I was reminded that in order to do so though requires commitment to work at developing the relationship with key people in market and a regular investment of effort. There might have been a time when UK businesses expected a healthy investment from the middle east without much reciprocity. That’s not the case anymore and very often our companies are now expected to demonstrate that they too have skin in the game and are prepared to invest in the UAE region themselves particularly with people and property whether its office, factory or residential.
We gained many insights, and the importance of cities was discussed regularly including at a PWC session on the built environment. With 54% of the world’s population living in urban areas, cities play such a pivotal role as motors of the global economy. The scale and the speed of the physical development in UAE is astonishing. When building works on the world’s tallest building the Burj Khalifa began in 2004 the surrounding area was desert but now it is a bourgeoning metropolis and thriving commercial zone.
However, the built environment including real estate and transport and other infrastructure, accounts for between 30-40% of emissions especially from buildings and construction. This sector clearly has a massive role to play in reducing the amounts of energy and changing the way the value chain operates.
One of my biggest takeaways was how simple and traditional solutions can often have the most impact. In Masdar City – a brand new build low carbon neighbourhood of Abu Dhabi it uses cooling towers inspired by medieval Persian & Egyptian techniques to produce air which can be up to 15 degrees cooler than the Summer temperatures and blown through the deliberately shaded streets to make life more comfortable. Some of these simple and radical low-tech solutions can be replicated in other places and some buildings in the US now include wind towers.
We also had the opportunity to take part in closed door 1-1 introductions and roundtables including with First Abu Dhabi Bank and with the Department of Economic Development. Along with our partners at Glasgow City Council who pitched aspects of the city’s Green Investment Prospectus, the Scottish Event Campus presented their ambitious net zero campus development plans and Glasgow Caledonian University and O’Herlihy and Co also presented their innovative project plans for tackling net zero, further demonstrating our credentials as a city at the forefront of net zero developments.
It is clear that we must continue to work together in Glasgow on our joint approach to trade and investment and adopt an ambitious programme helping more of our sustainable businesses and organisations to take advantage of the global opportunities with our partners overseas. Together we will get this done and help tackle the many sustainability challenges we face.
This article was first published in The Herald on Wednesday 13 December 2023
