UAE: Fines to apply as ministry starts Emiratisation checks on July 1

Starting July 1, authorities in the UAE will begin assessing whether private sector companies have achieved their Emiratisation targets for the first half of 2024. Firms with 50 employees or more that haven’t added 1 per cent more Emiratis to their payroll over the last six months will be fined.

This came as the Ministry of Human Resources and Emiratisation (MoHRE) confirmed June 30 as the final deadline for meeting targets for the first half.

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This year, the fine is Dh8,000 per month for each Emirati not hired. It was Dh7,000 per month last year, and Dh6,000 monthly in 2022. The fines will increase by Dh1,000 annually until 2026.

Private companies in the country are required to increase the number of their Emirati employees by two per cent every year. By the end of last year, companies were required to have 4 per cent Emiratis as employees. By the end of this month (June), this should be upped to 5 per cent. Before 2024 ends, a firm’s workforce must have 6 per cent UAE nationals.

Emiratisation rules

A federal law aims to raise Emiratisation target by 2 per cent annually to reach 10 per cent of a company’s work force by the end of 2026. The annual target is split in two – 1 per cent in the first six months, and the other 1 per cent in the second half of the year.

Early this year, Mohre has also started implementing the UAE Cabinet decision to expand the scope of Emiratisation to include firms with 20 to 49 employees. More than 12,000 companies with 20-49 employees, operating across 14 specific economic sectors, are now required to hire at least one Emirati in 2024 and another one in 2025

Use Nafis

Mohre urged companies that have yet to meet their Emiratisation targets to take advantage of the Nafis Programme’s digital platform, “which allows them access to a wide pool of qualified Emirati job seekers across various specialisations.”

Back in May this year, Mohre announced there are now more than 97,000 Emiratis working in about 20,000 private companies in the country.

“(This) underlines the effectiveness of the government’s Emiratisation decisions, policies, and initiatives, most notably the Nafis programme,” noted Mohre Minister Dr. Abdulrahman Al Awar.

He added the total number of Emirati employees in the private sector has grown at a rate of approximately 170 per cent since September 2021, when the government launched the Nafis programme, a federal initiative aimed at increasing the employability of Emiratis in the country's private sector.

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