Arabic belongs to the Semitic language family of the Afro-Asiatic language family. Its writing uses Arabic letters and is the fifth most widely spoken language in the world. There are 22 countries in the world with a population of about 300 million speaking Arabic as their mother tongue. The language is mainly used in the Middle East and North Africa. We collectively refer to these countries that use Arabic as their mother tongue as Arab countries. In this section, we will take the UAE, where e-commerce is relatively mature among the countries in this language family, as the main research model to introduce the culture and potential business opportunities of Arab countries.
The United Arab Emirates, referred to as the UAE, is located in the eastern part of the Arabian Peninsula.
The UAE standard time uses the Eastern Time Zone (GMT+4), which is 4 hours earlier than Greenwich Mean Time (GMT+0) and 4 hours later than Beijing Standard Time (GMT+8). The UAE is one of the countries in the world that has not yet opened a railway, but the country’s road, sea and air transportation networks are very developed. The seven emirates of the UAE are connected by highways, and the country has built nearly 4,000 kilometers of highways. In terms of shipping, the UAE has 14 modern ports with excellent conditions, including Abu Dhabi, Ajman, and Umm Al Quwain. These ports are equipped with advanced loading and storage equipment, and the sea routes are all over the world. In terms of aviation, Emirates Airlines currently has flights to more than 70 countries and regions in the world, which makes communication between the UAE and the international community very convenient.
The UAE is the sixth largest oil reserve country in the world, and the national economy is mainly based on the oil industry. In 2015, the country’s annual GDP reached 438.3 billion US dollars, and the per capita GDP reached 40,000 US dollars, ranking 31st in the world. At the same time, the UAE’s tourism industry is also one of the country’s important industries, and the tourism industry accounts for about 9% of the country’s GDP. As a world-famous tourist city, Dubai has many world’s bests, including the world’s only seven-star hotel, the Burj Al Arab, the world’s tallest building, the Burj Khalifa, and the world’s largest artificial island, the Palm Island. These attractions bring a large number of overseas tourists to the UAE every year. According to statistics, the number of international tourists in the UAE reached 17 million in 2015.