The United Arab Emirates has set an ambitious target: reduce its reliance on the Strait of Hormuz to zero. Yet the ports that anchor its economy — Jebel Ali and Khalifa — sit inside the very waterway the government hopes to bypass. Together, these two hubs handle the bulk of the UAE’s roughly US$1 trillion in annual non-oil trade, much of it moving to and from Asia, forming a central link in the logistics corridor connecting Singapore to Europe.
That status is not easily replicated. But heightened tensions between the United States and Iran have pushed exporters across Asia to hedge their bets, and the region’s ports outside Hormuz are emerging as the immediate beneficiaries.
Oman’s Port Renaissance
Oman’s terminals — Duqm, Salalah, and Sohar — are attracting shipping lines, investors, and free-zone commitments as cargo owners seek routes insulated from Hormuz’s volatility. Among them, only Salalah currently registers meaningfully in container throughput, handling 5.5 million twenty-foot equivalent units (TEU) in 2024. Saudi Arabia’s Jeddah, the region’s other major Hormuz workaround, moved 8.3 million TEU over the same period.
For shippers focused on reliability and continuity of service, this diversification signals a broadening menu of routing options — a development worth monitoring closely.
The Capacity Gap on the East Coast
The UAE operates its own ports along the Gulf of Oman, and Minister of Foreign Trade Thani Al Zeyoudi has outlined plans to channel investment into Khor Fakkan, Fujairah, and Dibba, alongside an entirely new facility slated for the country’s east coast.
“We’re moving towards having zero Hormuz dependency, and that’s regardless of whether it’s open or not,” Zeyoudi told Bloomberg, framing the strategy as insurance. “It’s going to open and we hope that will happen quickly, but we will not stop the new plan.”
The numbers, however, reveal the scale of the challenge. Khor Fakkan, the busiest terminal on the east coast, moved 2.5 million TEU last year — a fraction of Jebel Ali’s 15.5 million TEU and Khalifa’s 6.6 million TEU. Even with Khor Fakkan’s capacity set to expand from 3.5 million to 5 million TEU, it remains dwarfed by Jebel Ali’s 19-million-TEU capacity and Khalifa’s 10.5 million TEU.
Ramping up the east coast to shoulder a larger share of trade will require sustained, multi-year investment in infrastructure and connectivity.
DP World Holds Its Ground
DP World, the Dubai-government-controlled operator of the Jebel Ali superhub, appears largely unmoved by talk of zero reliance on Hormuz. The operator ranks among the world’s foremost, competing with China’s Cosco Shipping Ports, Hong Kong’s Hutchison Port Holdings, and Singapore’s PSA International.
“Customers are looking to build greater resilience into their supply chains, but resilience is not the same as replacing established hubs,” a company spokesman said. “In practice, customers are balancing optionality with cost and efficiency, which is why Jebel Ali continues to play a central role in regional and global trade.”
What distinguishes Jebel Ali, the spokesman noted, is that it functions as more than a transshipment point. Its port, free zone, logistics network, and multimodal reach create value through manufacturing, warehousing, and market access that “cannot be replicated quickly elsewhere.” The surrounding free zone has drawn a substantial share of foreign investment into the UAE, forming an economic ecosystem that concrete and cranes alone cannot recreate.
Customers seeking flexibility can already route cargo through Jeddah, Khor Fakkan, or Sohar, he added, but such options “complement, rather than replace” Jebel Ali.
Gulftainer Signals a Structural Shift
Gulftainer, operator of the Khor Fakkan terminal, argues that global trade is changing fundamentally. Announcing a restructuring on July 7, CEO Farid Belbouab said, “Customers are no longer looking for isolated logistics services. They are looking for resilient, intelligent, and fully integrated supply chain solutions.”
For cargo owners, this shift toward integrated, resilience-oriented services aligns directly with priorities around visibility, cost control, and disruption management.
Diplomacy May Decide the Outcome
Analysts caution that infrastructure tells only half the story. Robert Mogielnicki, a senior fellow at the Washington-based Arab Gulf States Institute, said “the Emiratis view zero dependency on Hormuz as a desired option, not an objective in itself.” Diversification “may help boost resilience,” he noted, but any eventual settlement over Hormuz would produce “winners and losers” among the UAE’s ports and free zones, with shippers voting with their cargo based on pricing and perceived risk.
Precedent supports the caution. “We have seen Red Sea traffic being slow to normalise following tensions with the Houthis,” Mogielnicki said, referencing the Iran-aligned movement’s attacks on shipping through the Bab el-Mandeb Strait, off Yemen, between 2023 and 2025.
Ultimately, the UAE’s future as Asia’s gateway to Europe may rest less on cranes than on diplomacy. “A negotiated settlement that ensures a durable return to stability in the Strait of Hormuz would be a huge relief for the UAE,” Mogielnicki said, adding that Emirati policymakers “aren’t going to sit around and hope for that to happen without plans B, C, and D.”
