China Pavilion at Expo 2020 Dubai and a transformative 2020 for the UAE

The pavilion will also highlight the country's fast developing leadership role in future-shaping technology and mega infrastructure projects including the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), 5G, autonomous vehicles that can share data and make complex decisions, and the world's largest radio satellite built to detect signs of extra-terrestrial life. This structure will vividly showcase China's profound culture and longstanding history by artistically integrating the Chinese elements with modern technologies.

China's pavilion at Expo 2020 will be among the largest at the six-month spectacle, and a sign of how the country's relationship with the UAE continues to grow. China is already at the centre of UAE life and at more than 300,000 people, Chinese citizens are within the top ten nationalities represented in the UAE.

Chinese tourist arrivals in the UAE are now exceeding one million and a half per annum and approximately 3.5 million travellers transit through the UAE per year. This is expected to grow to an even higher level, particularly during Expo 2020 Dubai. The expansion of Chinese is such that in recent years, the signage in shopping areas was updated to include Chinese Mandarin side by side with English and Arabic languages.

There is even a huge market and shopping centre, Dragon Mart, much-loved and renowned in the UAE for bargain-hunters, packed with Chinese products that include garments, jewellery, furniture, electronic goods and interior offerings. This has evolved to become the biggest Chinese trading hub outside China, with 120,000 visitors a day, a 500 per cent increase from the 20,000 per day it welcomed in 2010.