UAE’s Freelance Industry Booms Amid Financial Challenges

Currently, freelance work in the UAE has become even more popular due to the changes in legislation, development of new technologies and changes in the culture of work after Covid. The health care industry rates the need for professionals in areas such as software development, cyber security, artificial intelligence and data analysis. However, financial issues remain an issue for freelancers in this line of work cutting across the different fields.

Ever since the UAE started to offer flexible and affordable license solutions, co-founder of Outsized, a talent on-demand platform and Azeem Zainulbhai has stated that the freelancer registration has risen to 142% across the MENA region since the year 2022. Such an increase has positioned the UAE as one of the emerging freelance markets in the international market. UAE businesses are emanating the trend of outsourcing workforce from independent contractors to reduce cost while at the same time acquiring appropriate skills.

As of now, the shifting of employees to freelances has been realized to have the following prospects; While this has been expanding, freelancers experience several monetary challenges. Rory McLoughlin a freelance film director and organizer of Like Minds UAE Facebook group that has over 2000 active members pointed out that payment delays remain a significant issue. Meanwhile, freelancers are unable to exert the pressure to demand for quick cash and if perhaps the contract the firm insist of taking legal recourse the latter ends up harming the reputation of freelance workers. Further, the open admission of low skilled and lower charging freelancers has put pressure on the pricing front, reducing the chances of obtaining optimal prices for one’s services again reducing ones income.

New opportunities are arising in the field of AI and technology, Freelancer license category in Abu Dhabi has recently increased with an addition of 30 new professions in the sphere of AI development and 3D-model designing. These sectors provide fairly reasonable revenues, and social media freelancers such as the Arabic copywriters and translators are labors of high demand.

It empowers the freelancers in the UAE in terms of flexibility to select projects, skills variation, and working with international companies. Nevertheless, there are perceived threats that include; irregular job income, expensive health insurance and stiff competition. Looking at the above-discussed challenges, the professionals are recommended to update themselves with market regulations, find work before quitting the employment and be proactive in their search to counter the above challenges.