DUBAI - The Guangdong Build United Arab Emirates (UAE) 2012, the first fair and exhibition on building materials by companies from China's Guangdong province in the Gulf state, started on Monday in Dubai's neighboring sheikhdom Sharjah.

The three-day fair, which hosts some 30 companies from Guangdong province specialized on building materials, was officially opened by Sheikh Faisal Bin Khalid Mohamed Al Qassimi, chairman of Faisal Aviation and nephew of Sharjah's ruler Dr. Sheikh Sultan Al-Qassimi, in the presence of Chinese officials from South China's Guangdong province, the Chinese General Consulate in Dubai and businessmen from both sides.

Also present were members of China's local governments of Foshan, Chaozhou and Yunfu, as well as representatives of the China Council for the Promotion of International Trade in the Gulf Area.

Organised by the China Town Building Material Center, "the objective of the fair is to promote companies from Guangdong province, which is China's leading region in relation to ceramics and building material products," said Zhang Qinwei, President of the Guangdong Business Council in the UAE.

Zhang Yi, economic and commercial counselor at China's General Consulate in Dubai, who advises Chinese firms how to enter the market of the Gulf state, said that bilateral trade between the UAE and China hit a whopping $35.1 billion in 2011, representing an annual growth of 35 percent in the last decade.

Touring the exhibition, Sheikh Faisal said that he travelled to Guangdong many times, adding that "Chinese products convince in price and quality and we are glad we can help producers from Guangdong province to expand in the UAE."

Currently, some 4,000 Chinese firms reside in the UAE, 300 of which are from China's Guangdong province.

Zhuo Zhingiang, mayor of Yunfu, a city in Guangdong province, said that "Guangdong is the leading producer of ceramics in China, and industries in Yunfu are constantly striving to improve the quality of building material products."

This led Abdulla Saeed Al Zaabi, director of Business Registration at the Dubai Department of Economic Development (DED), to say that "I should soon travel to Guangdong to attract new firms from the province to open branches in Dubai...I travelled to Shanghai and promoted Dubai, and I think Guangdong shall move up to be on the agenda."

Kelvin Ke, managing director of Chaozhou Kedali Porcelain Industrial Co Ltd, expressed pride when Sheikh Feisal visited his stand. "We manufacture all sorts of useful home accessories like plates, bowls or boxes out of porcelain," Ke said. "With the help of our friends in Sharjah and the entire UAE, we are confident that our products can add value to the construction bonanza in the Gulf state," he added.

According to Citigroup Middle East in Dubai, the UAE is the region's second largest market at $560 billion, behind Saudi Arabia which Citi valued at $750 billion.

Visiting Mohamed Sharif, a Pakistani businessman who runs his own General Trading company in Sharjah, was impressed by the assortment at the fair. "China and Pakistan have always been close trading partners and my company has distribution agreements with a number of Chinese producers of building materials. This is why my company welcomes the growing influx of Chinese products to the UAE," he said, adding that "I think we should have such fairs on a regular basis, with exhibiting firms from different provinces in China.

Sharif will not be disappointed. According to Zhang Yi, "every year, there are a dozen of China-UAE trade fairs like the Guangdong Build United Arab Emirates (UAE) 2012, and we constantly hear of new initiatives coming up in the future."