DUBAI 21 June 2017: Dubai has revived a more than 125-years’ age-old custom of the endowment of palm trees by establishing the Endowment Park, a first collective endowment park and dates factory in the world. The project is located next to Mushrif Park, Dubai and will be spread over an area of 15 hectares.
It is in line with the directives of His Highness Sheikh Khalifa bin Zayed Al Nahyan, President of the UAE, to declare 2017 as the Year of Giving. Dubai Municipality and Mohammed bin Rashid Global Centre for Endowment Consultancy (MBRGCEC) have announced the project.
The new park combines the business model of crowdsourcing (a concept that has been successfully used in many economic projects) with the concept of innovative endowment adopted by the Mohammed bin Rashid Global Centre for Endowment Consultancy.
“We all know that Dubai is pioneering in innovation in different fields – today we announce one of its innovation in the charity field. Alihsan park will be the first collective-endowment park in the world under the name of UAE community,” said Hussain Lootah, Director General of Dubai Municipality.
“We will work soon on the infrastructure of the endowment park and we will then open the door for the community to donate palms from their houses and farms. The production of this park will be packed in an endowment date factory located in the same park. The dates will be distributed to needy segments, he added”.
Donate Palm Trees
The first collective-endowment Park in the world will be established with the members of the UAE community donating the palm trees, which in turn will become an agricultural endowment.
The project will also include a charity date-packing factory, which will allocate its entire production towards the needy members within the UAE community. The project has an expected annual production capacity of around 150 tonnes of dates.
The Endowment Park aims at opening the doors of sustainable charity to all its community members. The entire concept is derived from the 125-year old custom originating from the Hatta region, which had the social custom of endowing palms by traditionally donating the proceeds into charity and favouring the needy members of the community.
During the second half of 2017, Dubai Municipality will announce the launch of the invitation to donate towards the palms endowment for the park as soon as the infrastructure is completed on the project. The municipality will also issue the specific requirements for each endowment palm tree in order to ensure the quality of production within the Endowment Park.
By Angel Chan