The value of United Arab Emirates' crude oil exports rose 11.3 percent in 2006 to a record 178 billion dirhams ($48.5 billion), economy ministry data showed on Sunday. The average price of UAE crudes climbed 21.5 percent to $65 per barrel, compared with $53.50 per barrel in 2005, the ministry said.
Oil and gas account for around 26 percent of the gross domestic product in the UAE, a federation of the seven emirates including Dubai, the region's trade and tourism hub.
A near tripling of international oil prices in the five years to July has driven economic growth in the UAE, where GDP expanded 8.9 percent last year.
The value of last year's oil exports was almost three times as high as the figure for 2002 and the highest on record, economy ministry data showed.
Economic growth will slow to 7 percent in 2007, its slowest pace since 2002, as oil prices fall off last year's record highs, National Bank of Abu Dhabi (NBAD) said in a research note earlier this month.
NBAD expects the average price for benchmark Dubai spot crude to remain around $55 per barrel in 2007, down from $60 in 2006, the note said.
The United Arab Emirates economy grew at the third-fastest pace in at least five years in 2006, spurred by growth in petroleum, manufacturing, and wholesale and retail trade, the country's economy ministry said on Sunday.
The economy, the second-largest among Arab nations, expanded 8.9 percent to 389.5 billion dirhams ($106.1 billion), statistics received by Reuters showed. That compares with 11.9 percent in 2003 and 9.7 percent in 2004.
Petroleum rose 5 percent to 99.9 billion dirhams, manufacturing 13 percent and the wholesale and retail trade 10.5 percent, the data showed. Construction surged 16 percent.
"The non-oil sector is the engine of real growth. It's what is driving the UAE economy forward," said Simon Williams, regional economist at HSBC, who had estimated growth of 9.3 percent for the year. A Reuters survey of seven analysts in December put the average for 2006 at 8.9 percent.
UAE gross domestic product has grown 44.6 percent since 2002, fuelled partly by a tripling of oil prices in the five years to July. Governments of the world's biggest energy-exporting region, including Saudi Arabia, Kuwait and Qatar, have invested record oil revenue in infrastructure, industrial and real estate projects, spurring economic growth.
Public and private investment in the United Arab Emirates grew 29 percent to 121 billion dirhams compared with 2005 and consumption expanded 25 percent to 365 billion dirhams, the ministry said, without making clear whether the data were real or nominal.
The economy should grow by 6.2 percent this year, its slowest rate in five years, Minister of Economy Sheikha Lubna al-Qassimi said earlier this month.
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