Supporting the local industries and protecting our products

The Government is expected to exempt renewable and energy conserving devices from custom taxes and waive the 16% sales tax. For the Solar water heaters, wind systems and other energy-saving the incentives where already been implemented, since the begining of this year.

I hope that the industrial leaders and citizens are aware of the importance of "energy savings, or environmental awarness," but, they are already suffering from the high cost of operations and production leaving "the environment care" behind their concerns.

In a small country with small consumption rates and purchasing power and few factories and manufacturing, caring about the environment and speaking about "energy savings", " renewable energy" becomes only sort of a " Trendy" movement toward some fake strategies, unless it's been implemented the right way and taking into considerations the economical challengies and production competitiveness that we suffer to even achive.

Shouldn't the industry leaders fight for exempting all imports for Manufacturing inputs from taxes and sales, and imposing tarrifs on imported products that compete with the locally produced products? Implementing a protection strategy for the locally manufactured products to become more competitive! Our competitive advantage is diminishing due to the progressive increase in the inflation rates, high increase in production cost, and transfer of talented minds to serve the economy of other countries.

In summary, the proposed strategy is to exempt the imported raw materials and all the manufacturing inputs from taxes while imposing more taxes on the imported final products that compete with the local manufactured products.

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Renewable energy devices to be tax deducted ... not enough

AMMAN (JT)- Instructions governing a March government decision to exempt renewable energy and energy-conserving devices from customs duties are expected to be published next week, an official said.
Meanwhile, the government is expected to cancel the 16 per cent sales tax, a move, industry leaders said, which would encourage consumers to adopt the new devices.



In order to address the Kingdom’s energy crunch and to assist the move to energy-saving practices and responding to calls from the industry, the government took the exemption decision and published it in the Official Gazzette last month.

The measure comes in line with the Kingdom's energy strategy which seeks to increase dependence on local energy sources from the current 4 per cent to 25 per cent by 2015, and up to 39 per cent by 2020.

But full implementation and exact measures are to be unveiled next week, according to National Energy Research Centre (NERC) President Malek Kabariti.

Solar water heaters, wind systems and other energy-saving devices have all been exempted from customs duties and will soon be free of sales tax, he added.

“It was not easy to pass, but we came to an agreement that will be beneficial to both the industry and the people,” Kabariti told The Jordan Times.

Although the measure has yet to be implemented in full, the effects can already be seen, according to Ayman Maaitah, solar energy specialist and CEO of Millennium Energy Industries.

“This difference is huge, we have already reduced prices by 20 per cent or more.”

“It was supposed to be exempted of all customs duties and taxes, but till now, we have to pay sales tax,” Maaitah lamented, adding that the sector has received verbal promises from the government that the sales tax will be exempted soon.

A wider use of solar energy and other energy-saving devices have the potential to save the Kingdom's energy consumption by 25-50 per cent, according to experts in the sector.

The technology had been subject to 16 per cent sales tax and 23 per cent customs, which passed along a 40 per cent price increase on to consumers.

With full exemptions, the price of a solar-generated water heater will be reduced from JD500 to JD350, while solar energy for home heating, which currently costs JD10-15 per square metre, will drop by 20 per cent.

The new traffic law

A Police officer standing at one of Amman streets, Photo by Emad Salmeh


The "experts" say, as mentioned in the attached published article in Jordan Times, the cause of road killing goes to the following factors: 1) The Road. 2) The Vehicle. 3) The Driver. and awareness or change in mentality.
Maybe a good implementation of tough laws will enforce people to obay the orders, a dectatorial solution, isn't it? Enforcing a tougher Traffic law is not mentioned in the above mentioned causes of accidents and the experts listed some causes of the problem, but I belive they missed some.
Driving in Jordan is a reflection of a social-economical status of the citizens. What you see in the number of road killing, accidents, and even the fights and aggressive attitudes of the drivers in Jordan is not only caused by factors mentioned above, or the awareness of being a "good driver".

It's our education, ethics, and behaviors. How we drive is how we talk, how we work, how we treat each other, our moods, our patient, our attitudes, a reflection of the citizen, happiness and satisfaction or sadness, anger and greed. Not only have we had no proper roads to drive, or a depreciated cars caused by the holes in the streets, or an angry driver. We don't have a proper transportation alternative, and we don't even think of having one.

On the other hand, we need to focus on finding alternatives for transportation, if we focus on cars and traffic we will get more cars and traffic, if we focus on the people and places we will get more people and places.

A poster shows the amount of space taken up by cars, a bus, and bicycles used to transport the same number of people.

We will not solve the accidents and traffic problems by accommodating the use of vehicles. We fix some streets, we build parking garages, we dig some tunnels, then we enforce tougher traffic laws or we make some guerilla campaigns for implementing selective seasonal violations or we say lets give some awareness!

Our main target shall be to develop this country to make it more livable. We need to understand and educate ourselves and know what do we want? and how are we going to make it?

Finally, to be the leaders in the region development, we have to have the competency of change.

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The new Traffic law
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AMMAN - (JT) Experts and citizens said a new traffic law sent by the government to Parliament on Sunday was not enough to curb accidents, noting that a “change in mentality” was a more pressing need.

As deputies went into lengthy discussions on the legality of having a new law as an older temporary one was stuck at the Senate, citizens and experts told The Jordan Times that a crusade should be launched to change the mentality of motorists, pedestrians, educators and families.

Dean of Husn University College Saad Abu Qudais, who described road accidents as an “undeclared war on the innocent”, noted that the amendments to the law focus on drivers as the major factor in traffic accidents.

“There are other factors the proposed draft law does not address such as conditions of roads and vehicles as well as loopholes in road designs.”



The academician, who is an expert in transportation-related environmental problems, said: “It is not an issue of intensifying penalties and proposing harsher regulations.”

The draft law replaces a temporary traffic law introduced by the previous government in November that was rejected by the Lower House because it was seen as too harsh and aimed at collecting money through bigger fines, rather than addressing the problem itself.

The new law reduced fines and long prison terms, but remains stiffer than the previous versions of the traffic law.

As an example, the penalty for running a red light in the new law ranges from JD100 to JD200 in addition to a detention period of one week to a month, compared to a minimum JD250 fine proposed by the previous version that was rejected by the House.

Mohammad Dabbas, president of the Society for the Prevention of Road Accidents, agreed with Abu Qudais on the need for awareness rather than harsh penalties.

“We should first concentrate on how to make the public respect and abide by traffic regulations before we think of suggesting stiffer penalties," Dabbas said yesterday.

Like Abu Qudais, he also believes that all factors must be taken into consideration when tackling the alarming issue.

He said the Kingdom’s roads are overwhelmed by the increase in population and the rise in the number of vehicles.

Contrary to the view of the two experts, 65-year-old Souf resident Yusra Odeibat, who lost her son Mahmoud in a road accident last year, called for harsher penalties for violators.

Odeibat, who blames the death of her 24-year-old son on a “reckless driver”, said such people should be punished severely and traffic police “should be on every street to stop these people from killing others”.

But some drivers are not yet ready for a change of mentality.

“I cannot drive slowly,” said Salem Nassar, a minibus driver on the Amman-Zarqa route.

“If I do, other buses will make more money than I do, and this will get me into trouble with the bus owner,” he told The Jordan Times on Sunday.

He added that he has no choice but to pick up as many extra passengers as possible in his daily “race” against drivers of public transport vehicles.

Nassar claimed that corruption is involved in the law enforcement issue.

“Even if authorities intensify penalties, it will not do any good. These people [bus owners] have influential people supporting them and they rarely pay fines,” he charged.

But if this way of thinking prevails, said Dabbas, one in every three families will lose a member as a result of a road accident by 2020.

Over 111,000 traffic accidents occurred in 2007 claiming the lives of 979 people. The figure exceeds that of 2006 by 80, Abu Qudais said, citing statistics compiled by the Traffic Institute.

“This means that every 9.44 hours a citizen dies as a result of an accident,” the expert said, pointing out that during the past 10 years more than 7,000 people died and 175,000 injured because of road accidents.

According to a statistical analysis worked out by Abu Qudais, 37 per cent of traffic accident victims are pedestrians, 27 per cent drivers and 19 per cent front seaters. Passengers sitting in back seats constitute 8 per cent of total injuries and deaths.

The analysis also indicated that human error is blamed for 90 per cent of accidents with 10 per cent caused by other factors such as road and vehicle conditions and bad weather.
Violation Current fine/penalty Suggested fine/penalty

Driving under the JD500 and 3-6 months JD250 and one-month
influence of jail term imprisonment
drugs or alcohol
Improper use of lane JD100 and one- to JD50
four-week jail term
Smoking offence JD15 JD10
Failure to use JD150 and imprisonment JD50-JD100
tachometer between one week and a month
Failure to use taxi JD50 JD30
fare meter
Not using seatbelt JD25 JD15

Education and Economy in Jordan reform

According to a report released yesterday by the World Bank, Jordan is ranked on the top of the MENA region(Middle East North Africa)in educational reforms. However, we will see development in our countries if we invest more in Education and provide people with the necessary skills to be competitive.

Part of the problem we face is the the wrong mix of competencies produced by our education systems. Our Human Capital need to be allocated properly to compete at the international labour market.

In a keynote address, World Bank senior vice president for external affairs, Marwan Muasher, said:

“The quality of education in the region has not kept up with the needs of the economy; education systems do not support adequately the development by girls and boys of analytical skills, problem solving skills, critical thinking and innovation. It is time to pay greater attention to these skills to reach, if not exceed, the level of attention given to illiteracy and school enrolment.”

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5.4% the Inflation Rate in Jordan for 2007

This means that the price of purchasing goods increased about 5.4% over the past year. Also, means that the purchasing power of money decreased the same amount. With the food items increase in price reached up to 19% and 9% over the last year.

Compared to the USA last year inflation rate increased about 3.9%. And the consumer price index reached 210

Is this a reasonable increase?

(MENAFN Press) The data issued by the Department of Statistics indicate an increase in the Consumer Price Average during December 2007 by 1.57% compared with the previous month (November 2007) following the relative stability of prices witnessed since the end of 2006.

The Consumer Price Index (which represents the weighted average for all commodities and services in the consumer basket) reached 124.62 percentage points during December 2007 (as compared with 124.62 during November 2007).



The report shows also that the increase which took place in December 2007 (as compared with November 2007) is due to an increase in the prices of some commodities namely:" Meats and Poultry", "Diary and its products and Eggs", Rents, "Clothing and Footwear" and Vegetables. Meanwhile, prices of some commodities have retreated in December (Fruits, Communications and Personal Care).

The Annual Inflation Rate, which measures the percentage of price increase between 2007 and 2006, reached 5.39% in 2007 as compared with 2006. Meanwhile the inflation rate was 6.25%in 2006 as compared with 2005. The report shows that the registered price rise of food items by 9.3% was the main reason behind the registered increase of the inflation rate in 2007.

This increase has contributed to an increase in the inflation rate by 3.7 percentage points while the non-food items contributed to 1.6 percentage points. It is worthy to mention that prices of food items have increased at varying percentages in 2007 and reached 19.9% at the maximum for the vegetables group, and 1.1% at the minimum for the spices and food additives.

Limiting Chain Stores in our neighborhoods

Should chain stores be required to fit in with the character of a neighborhood, and should their proliferation be capped? Those are some of the crazy ideas being tossed in my mind. But, WOW these are some drastic measures for a capitalist society. We need to start working toward formulating a retail zoning plan for the neighborhoods that would prevent chain stores from displacing local businesses and generally keep them from swamping the area more than they already have. Will local politicians' endorse the plan? It's way too early to tell, but we may be approaching the day when enjoying a gingerbread latte, Starbucks latte, while strolling Rainbow St. could be considered a dangerous political high-wire act.

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Income Generating Projects

Source: Petra

The picture above shows a workshop carried out by the Higher Council for Youth seeking to provide job opportunities for young women in the desert village, which has high unemployment rates. Beneficiaries are trained to manufacture handicrafts from available raw materials and sell them, thus generating a regular income. The project also seeks to activate the role of local civil and women’s societies and give the youth access to the labour market.

Building talents and producing a unique pieces of arts and crafts while generating income and developing the societies.



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Automobile Factory in Jordan

A JD200 million Chinese auto factory planned to be set up in Jordan will create around 500 job opportunities for Jordanians and this figure is expected to reach 2,000 upon the completion of the plant’s four phases. Moreover, a new academy will be established to produce a skilled labour force in the fields of electronics and mechanics.



Mohammad Qalam, director general of Chery Jordan Company Ltd., told The Jordan Times on Monday that the construction of the factory will start early 2008 and production is expected to start by the end of the year.

Other stakeholders include Al Hokair Holding Company and the Dallah Al Baraka Group.

Qalam added that the company will sign a memorandum of understanding with the Jordan Armed Forces (JAF) under which the military will become a partner in the plant, to be implemented in four phases.

The agreement was signed in October on the sidelines of a visit to China by His Majesty King Abdullah.

“The first stage of the project will be manufacturing around 700 medium- and large-size commuters,” said Qalam, adding the second phase will extend the plant’s capacity to produce commercial vehicles such as pickup and dump trucks.

A new academy will be established within the project’s third phase aiming to produce a skilled labour force in the fields of electronics and mechanics.

“This academy will represent a nucleus to provide regional markets, especially Gulf countries, with skilled Jordanian workforce in the fields of manufacturing and maintaining vehicles,” Qalam said.

The top executive pointed out that the last phase of the project will target the manufacture of fancy cars which will be marketed in local and regional markets.

“Our initial target is to hit the 1,000 mark during the first two years of production as we expect a continuous increase in demand for our product,” he added.

“Our product will effectively compete with other types in terms of price and quality. Besides, the product will focus on lowering fuel consumption through introducing an advanced technique of fuel combustion called Compressed Natural Gas,” he said.

According to Qalam, the plant will create around 500 job opportunities for Jordanians who will constitute 95 per cent of the plant’s manpower, adding that this figure is expected to reach 2,000 upon the completion of the plant’s four phases.

Chery Jordan Company Ltd. was established in 2004, in partnership with the Chinese SAIC Chery Automobile Company, as the exclusive supplier of automobile parts and their accessories for Chery vehicles.

Slow Seasonal business ...Why?

Uhm Ali Charity Gorilla campaign, Sameen the friend of the Poor, Photo by: Emad Salameh

You can read below an interesting analysis for the drop in the seasonal sales. Yes, it's about the economics that I am not gonna talk about here, however, I see other factors need to be mentioned:

1) Psychology of the consumers: The city is becoming one of the most depressing cities in the world. You hardly can see someone smiling, laughing, or happy about his status. So, people don't have that motive to celebrate the holidays.

2) Alternative "new" Stores and Shopping Malls: the increased number of shopping malls and discount stores is taking a large percentage of sales than the traditional street market stores especially in the winter season. Ex: City mall and Le Carrefour .

3) Traffic: The increased city traffic congestion affects the purchasing power especially when shopping at major hubs like: Downtown, Jabal Hussein, and Swefieh.

4) Availability of parking spots: Finding a parking spot is becoming a nightmare especially in street markets, while the malls have enough car parking comparing to the municipality that's not providing enough spots.

5) The Political instability of the surrounding countries like: Lebanon, Palestine, and Iraq. Which makes us unwilling to celebrate the holidays.

6) Sales Strategy: Even this is the Season we can't see any real Sales. If it's the holiday season shouldn't the retail shops start thinking about making a real sales on the merchandises that coincide with the Holidays season? With low profit margins they can sell more.

And as mentioned, the increase in the prices of Sweets especially after the latest rise in the Sweets Bakery and Nuts.

We need to search for the real reasons behind our problems in order for us to find the right solutions.

I sound pessimistic, but, I have to be honest and say what I feel. There are some good initiatives in the country, but, I see other indications that need to be taken more seriously.

AMMAN (JT)- The holiday season, especially this year when Eid Al Adha is immediately followed by Christmas, was hoped to be the high season for various businesses, but shopkeepers say the situation is disheartening so far.

Garment, sweets, nuts, coffee and shoes vendors said Monday business was so much “below expectation”.

“We expected that the government’s decision to disburse salaries to civil servants and the army before Eid Al Adha would send the market thriving, but it is not happening,” said Zeid Abu Wazzan, a garment retail-shop owner in Jabal Hussein. Abu Wazzan, who also owns a wholesale store, attributes slow business to two major factors. “The prices of clothes are more expensive than they were before Eid Al Fitr [in October]. Plus, the weather is not stable and retailers are reluctant to buy from wholesale shops. Thus there is not much for people to buy anyway.“ A men’s clothes shopkeeper in downtown Amman said: “Our sales for Eid Al Adha are below 40 per cent of Eid Al Fitr sales.” In his view, the economic situation makes it hard for people to buy new clothes for family members for both occasions separated by 70 days, so they usually buy for Eid Al Fitr and keep the same clothes to use for Al Adha. The Jordan News Agency, Petra, reported on Monday that markets of second-hand clothes in Irbid were witnessing crowds of customers due to the unaffordable prices of brand-new items. Hard times do not haunt the garment business alone. A sales assistant at a nut and chocolate store in Sports City told The Jordan Times that there is decline in demand. “Usually, the few days before either eid, people buy coffee, chocolates and nuts to offer their guests, but for this eid, sales are down, compared to past years,” he said. “I think the drop in sales is due to the increase in prices of nuts by an average of 30 per cent, especially after imposing sales tax on some kinds of nuts. In addition, the price of milk almost doubled recently, which led to increases the prices of chocolates and consequently a reduction in sales,” the shop employee told The Jordan Times. Employees at sweets shops in Amman said they hope that Tuesday will change the trend, especially since people like to buy the eid sweet, mamoul, fresh. But so far, the season is not that favorable. Even beauty salons and hairstylists say that customers for this eid are smaller in number than they were in the previous eid. “Customers are not as many as we witness ahead of eids,” said Abu Walid, an owner of a barbershop in Abdali. He attributed the slow business partly to the cold weather and the economic situation. “When they have to choose between food and a haircut, they definitely go for food,” he said. Meanwhile, Samah Abdul Karim, a hairstylist at a hair salon in west Amman’s Seventh Circle area, said the saloon is already overcrowded with women and girls of different ages, yet business is not as thriving as it was in the days preceding Eid Al Fitr. For shoe stores, however, the case was different. Shopkeepers said that people in any case need to buy shoes for the cold season, so they tend to wait till the eid to do that. Eid Al Adha this year coincides with winter solstice, also known as midwinter, which occurs around December 21 or 22 each year in the northern hemisphere, marking what is known in the traditional culture as the marbaniyeh, or the coldest 40 days in the year.

Discount Stores, Le Carrefour opening in Amman - transforming our cities:

(Le-Carrefour discount store at City Mall - photo by Emad Salameh)

Discount stores have benefits on the communities and economy, but, it also have it’s disadvantages.

When these stores opened in Amman back in the late 80’s lead by C-Town and Safeway, they had a big impact on the local businesses substituting the shopping experience from the traditional shopping of small local grocery stores Baqala and markets to bigger exported discounted stores.

One of the biggest discount stores is Le-Carrefour, like Wal-Mart and K-Mart they destroyed communities, and whipped out stores. This is accomplished through their policies of importing goods that have been produced under slave-labor conditions overseas. Often, our country gives tax incentives, for the right to be destroyed.

Discount stores reflect the deadly implementation of our country to the imperial

Rome model, and our countries existing condition. Unable to produce physical goods to sustain it’s own existence, our country, like Rome, sucks in imported goods from around the world, using the dollar, that our currency is attached to, that is over-valued by 50%-60%.

Amman has been transformed from a producer to a consumer society. Throughout the history Arabs produced new value that contributed to the mankind’s advancements. We consume goods that others produce, which discount stores markets. Discount stores dictate, through it’s demand for low prices, that it’s suppliers outsource their production to foreign nations, further ripping down our countries battered domestic manufacturing and agricultural capabilities, in a self feeding process.

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Building what and why Amman?

I was wondering for the past few days about something I don't understand regarding the real estate construction boom in Amman and the future. I talked before about the effect of arts and architecture on shaping the identity of the societies in my previous post From an out of place architecture to an out of place identities. but my question is:"What and WHY?."

What kind of services will Amman have in these projects? Other than attracting real estate developers to build houses, offices, hotels and resorts. If we study the service and manufacturing industries and make a comparative advantage with other countries do we find any services that we might be better serve or produce?

Shouldn't we benchmark the services and products that we can produce here in Jordan to use our scarce resources of land and people that gives us more advantage and success over other countries in the region and the world?

What if manufacturing, which is not taking that much attention, is the sector that we need to focus on! or maybe farming! or fishing, no we don't have much sea here, or..or...

The investors that we are attracting are developers who are only interested in money by building and selling to other developers who will also sell to others. We thought that they will bring more jobs to our country but obviously they are outsourcing all their labors, materials, and operations from other resources in other countries.

Instead of bringing investors giving them all these incentives shouldn't we first give more incentives to the citizens, giving them jobs and supporting their businesses! How much we did to support the Local businesses? Will these investors participate in the development of our country? who have the power here: the citizens, the government, or the investors? I am afraid that we will end up being slaves working to foreign companies in our own country. Do we really want to build another little Dubai here? "that will be another subject to talk about: Why Dubai? "

The scarcity of resources in this country and the fierce competition in the emerging global markets requires from us to think million times about what shall we focus on?

Finally, we ask ourselves: are we building local and thinking global? or the other way.