Vietnam has introduced its first comprehensive legal framework for halal products and services, with Decree 127 taking effect on June 1, establishing rules on certification, labelling, and traceability in a move aimed at expanding the country's halal exports and also attracting Muslim tourists.

The decree, issued in April, requires companies to register with the Ministry of Science and Technology before conducting halal training, consultancy, or certification, and strengthens labelling requirements so halal products are clearly identified on packaging.

The framework is being paired with institutional support for exporters. The HalalViet Promotion and Experience Centre, recently launched in Hanoi, plans to represent Vietnamese businesses at halal trade expos in Indonesia, Malaysia, and Turkiye.

"We are working with experts to support domestic businesses, helping them not only achieve halal certification but also better understand market needs and develop products that meet actual consumer demand," a centre representative said.

The regulation addresses longstanding inconsistency in the sector, where suppliers and customers often applied differing interpretations of halal standards, making it difficult for food businesses to source certified ingredients. The decree provides a single framework for all participants in the halal value chain.

Vietnam's halal exports were valued at more than $700 million according to figures cited by the Department of Vietnam Customs, though estimates vary depending on how halal trade is defined.

With the new framework covering food, beverages, and tourism services, Vietnam is positioning itself to compete in the growing global halal market.

Türkiye and Saudi Arabia have signed two preliminary agreements to foster cooperation in logistics and drive regional connectivity. 

The two memorandums of understanding signed by Saudi and Turkish transport ministers will facilitate the construction of logistics centres and encourage joint initiatives across all facets of the railway sector. 

Transport volumes between Türkiye and Saudi Arabia hovered around 20,000 prior to 2012. 

“Although we currently fall short of that figure due to regional developments, our goal is to take our cooperation beyond even that level,” state-owned Anadolu Agency quoted Turkish transport and infrastructure minister Abdulkadir Uraloglu as saying.

Türkiye plans to modernize the historic Hejaz Railway and extend it to Oman to create an alternative global trade route to the Strait of Hormuz as well as for tourism purposes, according to Uraloglu.

The Hejaz Railway was originally built between 1900 and 1908, stretching about 1,322 kilometers between Damascus in Syria and Medina in Saudi Arabia. It was later expanded to nearly 1,900 kilometers with additional lines. 

Türkiye inked agreements with Syria and Jordan in April to modernize their railway systems with the eventual aim to create a Southern Europe-Persian Gulf transport corridor. The network was expected to take four to five years to build, Turkish transport minister had said at the time.

The initial stage involves connecting Türkiye to Aleppo, utilizing the existing Aleppo-Damascus-Jordan network, passing through Saudi cities of Medina and Makkah, with Oman as its final destination. 

Türkiye and Saudi Arabia are monitoring developments on the Syria-Jordan-Iraq routes, Uraloglu said at the recent signing. “Two test runs starting from Türkiye through Iraq and extending to Saudi Arabia have clearly demonstrated the feasibility of this route."

The road project extending from Iraq’s Basra Gulf to the Turkish border is also underway, with its design phase complete. The corridor, which includes highways, railways, energy, and communication lines, will be realized through international funding in partnership with the UAE, Qatar, Iraq, and Türkiye, according to the media body. 

The construction of new and revival of old or damaged transport projects is key to establishing regional connectivity. Last month, Lebanon launched a tender process for a railway rehabilitation project linking the northern city of Tripoli with the Abboudiyeh area on the Lebanon-Syria border. 

Türkiye restored a strategic 350-kilometer railway along the Syrian border to freight traffic in April, after its first comprehensive rehabilitation in over a decade.  
 

Dubai's office market posted a sharp rise in activity in the first quarter of 2026, with transaction values more than tripling year-on-year to AED8.2 billion ($2.2 billion) across roughly 1,600 deals, even as regional tensions weighed on volumes in March.

Sales prices climbed nearly 25% year on year, and rents rose around 20%, driven in part by strong demand for off-plan offices, a segment that had barely registered before this year. Al Sufouh 1, Business Bay and Jumeirah Lakes Towers accounted for the bulk of activity, with the top five locations representing over 70% of all first-quarter transactions.

January and February drove the bulk of deal volumes, accounting for more than four-fifths of the quarter's activity. March saw a year-on-year dip of over 10%, with ready transactions falling by nearly two-thirds as regional tensions escalated following the outbreak of the Iran conflict on February 28.

Commercial real estate data for April and May shows transaction volumes broadly flat year on year at around 900, though prices continued to climb with the median rising by three-quarters to approximately AED3.2 million and the per-square-foot rate more than doubling to AED3,600.

Company formation figures point to sustained occupier demand. Dubai International Financial Centre registered 775 new companies in the first quarter, with March its strongest month, up nearly 60% year on year. Abu Dhabi Global Market reported a 5% year-on-year rise in company registrations in March.

Chinese electric vehicle maker BYD has suspended plans for a $1 billion factory in Turkiye, opting instead to expand production capacity in Hungary as EU tariffs make European manufacturing more cost-effective than importing from nearby markets.

The company has put on hold a proposed plant in the Aegean province of Manisa, announced in mid-2024 and intended to produce 150,000 electric and hybrid vehicles annually, with its first compact EV now set to come off a Hungarian assembly line by year-end.

The move deals a significant blow to Turkiye's automotive ambitions. "There would have been benefits for supply chains, jobs, research and development, battery production, side industries as well as AI, so many diverse contributions," said Anıl Şentürk, chair of the automotive committee at the Istanbul Chamber of Commerce. "This was a direct foreign investment, so its contribution would not only have been to the automotive sector but the country's economy itself."

The Manisa facility, when fully operational, would have employed 5,000 people, with most of its output destined for export. The project's suspension follows rising EU tariffs on imported electric and hybrid vehicles, which undermined the cost case for building in Turkiye rather than within the bloc. BYD is also in discussions to take on space at an existing plant in Germany.

The suspension carries additional risks for BYD in Turkiye. The Turkish government granted the company an exemption on most import tariffs in exchange for the investment commitment, an arrangement that helped BYD capture a 24% share of EV and hybrid sales in the country last year. Halting or cancelling the Manisa plant could expose the company to legal action and the loss of those trade advantages.

"If the decision is final, BYD is most likely to be stripped of their advantages in the local market and potentially lose this market to other Chinese competitors or European models," Şentürk said.

BYD has not ruled out returning to Turkey at a later date.

Banks across the Middle East & Africa lack artificial intelligence specialists required to industrialize the technology across institutions, a new study has identified.

Talent remains the core deterrent to scaling AI initiatives across MEA banks, as the region continues to face relevant personnel shortages, the Evident AI MEA Index report has revealed.

UAE lenders have emerged as best performing banks in Evident’s AI index for banks - MEA, assessing 25 of the largest Middle Eastern and African banks on the quality of their talent stacks, their innovation efforts, the tech leadership of their top executives and the guardrails they’ve set up to govern AI effectively.

UAE-based Emirates NBD leads all banks in the Middle East and Africa on AI maturity, edging out local peer First Abu Dhabi bank, the UAE’s largest bank by assets, which ranked third.

South Africa's Standard Bank Group and Nedbank Group, which ranked second and fourth respectively, have prioritized customer preferences and behaviours in their AI deployment.

Emirati and South African lenders dominating the index have emphasized high-impact processes such as payment processing, onboarding, risk analytics and customer advisory.

Emirates NBD has hasnt concentrated as many resource on R&D or experimentation as other lenders and instead has opted for deployment and scale. The lender has more AI staff focused on software implementation and product management – roles critical to connecting AI to business goals – than any other bank ranked, and has reported tangible results - over 98,000 AI-enabled interviews helped save 13,000 recruiter hours and around $400,000.

First Abu Dhabi Bank has focused on scaled enterprise deployment, having automated 50% of its cross-border payments, while AI advisors have helped increase revenue per relationship manager by 30%.

Saudi Arabia’s Al Rajhi (#9), Dubai-based Mashreq Bank (#10), Abu Dhabi Commercial Bank (#12), Qatar National Bank (#16), National Bank of Kuwait (#18) and Dubai Islamic Bank (#21) made it to the index.  

Yet a dearth of specialist AI personnel is limiting the technology’s proliferation, forcing banks to rely heavily on imported expertise. MEA banks employ an average of 300+ AI professionals, compared to a global benchmark of more than 1,750.

Within MEA, AI development staff account for 0.49% of the overall employee base. Not only is the density of regional talent pools significantly below the global benchmark of 0.9%, but they are also unevenly distributed, higher in South Africa (0.95%) and much lower in the UAE (0.29%), Kuwait (0.29%) and Saudi Arabia (0.16%).

Furthermore, MEA banks are increasingly exposed to the global AI talent squeeze, the report said, “compounded by geopolitical instability and structural labour market pressures”.

Most banks invest in AI training programs, but these are not at parity and lag behind global standards.

“Beyond employee training, banks are actively responding to AI talent constraints through internal capability-building efforts that include executive education programs, internal AI events, and targeted graduate or internship pathways. At present, such investments remain uneven and fragmented across the cohort,” the study added.

The World Economic Forum estimates that AI investments across banking, insurance, capital markets and payment businesses will reach $97 billion by 2027.