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Dubai 2000 shopping gala opens on March 1

DUBAI: The affluent city state of Dubai pushes the all-out celebration of consumerism a step further when the 2000 shopping festival opens on March 1.

Every day of the month, a Rolls Royce Silver Seraph will be raffled off in a draw limited to 5,000 people each paying 55 dollars. The UK-based luxury car maker said this represents the biggest single order ever received from one customer.

Tickets went on sale on Sunday as newspapers warned they will be snapped up.

And that is only the tip of the iceberg for a strike-it-rich extravaganza for which the Gulf desert emirate has become famous.

A big four-wheel drive car will also be raffled off daily, as will a kilo of gold.

Each week a mother will win more than $27,000 in shopping vouchers and so on and on through a bonanza of prizes and promotions designed to pull in the punters.

Dubai knows how to pull on in with the festival growing bigger and bigger each year since it began in 1996.

Last year saw a record 2.4 million visitors and unprecedented sales of $1.12 billion, acccording to the organisers, a partnership of the government and the retail and the tourist sectors.

The 1998 festival brought in 2.28 million visitors and incremental sales of $ one billionÑ just over eight percent of GDPÊÑ in the emirate, which has a population of about 800,000.

However, the organisers go to great pains to avoid cricitism of glorifying a "shop-till-you-drop' mentality.

"The Dubai Shopping Festival has managed to add a social dimension to a shopping event through themes that successfully weave the human element into a commercial avtivity," said Moosa Abbas, a member of the organising committee.

Mother is the theme of this year's bash, after the family took price of place in 1999.

It is all part of the successful selling of "brand" Dubai, turning the city state into a booming trade and tourist centre before the oil runs out.

Hundreds of sideshow events are lined up to entertain the tired shoppers, from concerts and street theatre to a kid's carnival, camel convoys and a giant fireworks display every evening over the Creek which divides the city.

A huge global village showcases the cultures and handicrafts of 30 countries, A $5.5 million cable car has been built along the Creek and the world's richest horse race Ñ with a $ six million, first prize Ñ is run during the festival on March 25.

The Festival basks in balmy temperatures below 30 degree Celsius (B6F), but such has been its big business success, a repeat holiday edition is now staged under the name of Summer Surprises when the thermometers brushes 50­C (122F) AFP