News

Dubai / WAM Adnoc Distribution announced that its dividend policy will see the 2020 dividend increase to AED2.57 billion, an increase of 7.5 percent compared to 2019. The announcement was made on Tuesday during the company’s General Assembly meeting which was held remotely via video conference as part of the Adnoc Distribution’s measures to ensure the safety and well-being of ...

AJMAN / WAM HH Sheikh Humaid bin Rashid Al Nuaimi, Supreme Council Member and Ruler of Ajman, issued Emiri Decree No. 7 for 2020, to adopt the government’s package to support Ajman’s local community and business sector. The decree aims to reduce the economic and financial burdens on the local community and business sector and overcome the social and economic ...

DUBAI / WAM The Ministry of Community Development (MoCD) has launched four interactive channels under a new initiative named ‘Taaluf’ to provide family counselling for free to all UAE community members. In a statement, the Ministry said that the launch of the counselling initiative aims to mitigate the psychosocial and mental health impacts of Covid-19 on individuals during home quarantines ...

Bloomberg Chinese manufacturing activity rebounded strongly in March, signalling that the world’s second-largest economy is restarting just as it faces a growing threat from slumping external demand. For manufacturing, the official purchasing managers’ index rose to 52.0 this month, according to data released by the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) on Tuesday. That’s up from a record low of 35.7 ...

Bloomberg India’s coronavirus response has unwittingly done away with the endless paperwork that has come to define bureaucracy, as electronic files replace physical records and technology makes in-person meetings redundant. The Finance Ministry is practicing the government’s 21-day social distancing order to prevent the spread of coronavirus by moving all communication online, while keeping minimum staff on roster to attend ...

Bloomberg Indian Railways, the world’s fourth-biggest network, is converting at least 5,000 coaches into isolation wards amid fears the world’s most populous country after China may not have adequate infrastructure to deal with the pandemic. Mosquito nets and charging points for mobile phones and laptops have been fitted, and space has been created for paramedics, Indian Railways said in a ...

Bloomberg Indonesia plans to mobilize volunteers to fight the spread of coronavirus in coastal villages and the vast hinterlands of the archipelago with part of a $4.4 billion rural budget to be used to fund the initiative. The squads of volunteers will help authorities in increasing awareness about the pandemic in the country’s almost 75,000 villages, collect data on people ...

Bloomberg Hong Kong is warning residents to abide by home quarantine orders and social distancing regulations or they will face criminal prosecution and fines, as the Asian financial centre continues to battle a resurgence in imported coronavirus cases. The city has already caught more than 70 people violating some of the more than 50,000 home quarantine orders, sent them to ...

Bloomberg Japanese sellers of masks, toilet paper and other sanitary products are turning out to be rare beneficiaries of the coronavirus. Sales of masks, alcohol wipes and other healthcare products jumped by about 47% at Japanese drug stores, a record in trade ministry data going back to 2014. Outlays on daily necessities including toilet paper surged 31%, also a record. ...

Bloomberg UK consumers scaled back their unsecured borrowing in February as the country battled flooding and the start of the coronavirus update. Loans to households rose just 877 million pounds ($1.09 billion) from January, when they rose 1.1 billion pounds, the Bank of England said in a report. At the same time, mortgage approvals jumped to 73,546, the most since ...