Having easily weathered the turbulence of the international economic downturn, Brunei Darussalam’s Islamic financial service sector is looking forward to new opportunities as the tide of the global recession recedes. Thanks to the sound regulatory environment created by the state over the past decade, Brunei Darussalam’s Islamic financial institutions have gained a reputation for meeting the…
Brunei Darussalam's residential property sector is in the process of picking up, with banks targeting a new generation of buyers by providing easy access to credit and developers stepping up their roll-out of new projects aimed at a younger population. Over the past year or two there have been an increasing number of younger buyers looking to become homeowners, a trend actively encouraged by lenders…
Brunei Darussalam is pushing ahead with plans to establish the Sultanate as a leading data centre, a part of a wider programme to strengthen its existing IT sector and further diversify the country's economy through expanding its communications infrastructure. On April 14, the switch was thrown on Brunei Darussalam's new global link, the Asia-American Gateway (AAG), a high-bandwidth, optical-fibre…
Faced with a shortage of land for urban development, industry and agriculture, and a rising population, Brunei Darussalam is considering promoting the construction of vertical residential units to overcome the country’s housing shortage. If adopted, the proposal to build up rather than build out would mark a major shift in the country’s construction practices, as well as in cultural norms, where…
In keeping with its role as a modern and rapidly expanding city, Brunei Darussalam's capital city Bandar Seri Begawan is to be the subject of a detailed master plan, with an extensive makeover of the capital's transport system central to the project. In August 2007, the area within the municipal boundaries of the capital was expanded from just under 13 sq km to 100 sq km, in part a reflection of…
Brunei's real estate sector appears to be little affected by the global recession, with transaction levels remaining stable and prices relatively flat, though it is unlikely the property market will experience strong growth in the short term due to a number of issues limiting investment activity. According to Lim Poh Yeh, the general manager of White Castle Real Estate and Development, demand for…
Barbados is looking to strengthen its capital markets, encouraging more firms to list on the stock exchange, pushing for greater regional co-operation and greater participation by locals in the market. The main focal point for the country's capital markets is the Barbados Stock Exchange (BSE), known until 2001 as the Securities Exchange of Barbados. Though well structured and regulated, the exchange…
Brunei Darussalam is seeking to tap into the non-food halal production, with both pharmaceutical products and side materials offering great potential. Apart from producing a growing range of foodstuffs that qualify as halal or pure under Islamic law, Brunei has established itself as a halal accreditation centre, using the Brunei Halal Brand (BHB) as a mark of quality for goods produced both locally…
Launched in August last year, Brunei Halal Brand (BHB) has been trying to establish itself as a leading player for products acceptable to the world's Muslim community. Having started out as a means of certifying domestically produced goods as halal - meeting the requirements set down under Sharia law as being both pure and manufactured or processed in a manner in line with religious tenets - BHB is…
Copyright piracy is a matter of concern in the sultanate, according to industry experts, but officials maintain that both legislation and available resources are up to the job of providing copyright protection. "The Attorney General's Chambers has available prosecutors to take proper cases to court, and has done so before. [The office] also has an open door policy to rights holders, [who] have approached…
