Omani town of Khasab profits from Eid supply chain to UAE

• Town in Oman-UAE ‘green corridor’
• Simplified customs procedures
• 10,000 tonnes of food moved in 3 days

Traders in the Omani frontier town of Khasab are seeking to fill any gaps in food supplies to the UAE and wider Gulf caused by the Iran conflict, especially as Eid Al Fitr festivities get underway.

Khasab, on the Musandam peninsula in the northern tip of Oman, is on the coast of the Strait of Hormuz, where Iran is restricting shipping supplies to and from the Gulf states. 

“This has been the most profitable Eid for us with all these food orders from the UAE. This is a small town but its location close to the UAE make it crucial in these hard times,” Layth Al-Farsi, a food distributor at Khasab, told AGBI. 

Oman’s ministry of commerce and industry said more than 10,000 tonnes of fruit and vegetables have crossed by land from Khasab to the UAE during the past three days.

The supply chain is “an ongoing process to continue through the Eid holiday“, the ministry said. The first day of Eid is March 20. Oman has announced a five-day holiday, while the UAE has four days. 

Khasab is part of an Omani-UAE ‘green corridor’ which allows goods to arrive at the sultanate’s ports and move across the border with simplified customs procedures, the ministry said. 

The town has delivered 22,000 live goats and sheep to consumers in the UAE in a record shipment, the ministry said. 

But traders said that trucks are still queuing up to transport food to the UAE for Eid consumption. 

The UAE imports between 85 percent and 90 percent of its food, according to the World Economic Forum.

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Oman’s ministry of transport, communication and information technology is building warehouses in the northern city of Sohar close to the UAE border to ease possible food shortages caused by the war. 

Earlier this week, the UAE said it has assured an uninterrupted flow of food, agricultural and animal consignments through all its entry points in preparation for Eid.

The UAE received 1,454 livestock consignments from January 1 to March 18, according to Mohammed Saeed Al Nuaimi, undersecretary at the UAE ministry of climate change and environment.

Border entry points across all emirates, including those with Oman, have been operating at maximum capacity, Nuaimi said.