High rents make life difficult

Readers express concern over rising rents and stagnant salaries. Other topics: driving, veganism, oil prices.

Readers express concern over rising rents as salaries remain stagnant. Silvia Razgova / The National

I am waiting to see a reasonable change in the rent policy in the capital (Abu Dhabi rents must be watched, November 10). It is also necessary to raise salaries by about 10 per cent. With expenses increasing, it would be impossible to live here if salaries remain static.

Shazeena Hussain, Abu Dhabi

People feel helpless as landlords keep raising rents. There should be a rent cap like before.

Amir Maqsood, Abu Dhabi

Why are drivers ignorant about pedestrians?

In reference to your editorial Pedestrians deserve to be protected (November 8), why don't some drivers know that they're supposed to give way on pedestrian crossings? Don't they all have to take a test here? Perhaps the driver training is not up to scratch.

Dave Pryce, Dubai

Better training is needed, but how about having police, not just cameras, monitor the roads? Fines for reckless driving also need to be increased.

Anita Welch, Abu Dhabi

I wonder why drivers do not stop for pedestrians here. Is it lack of knowledge? In Singapore I saw drivers giving way to pedestrians even if they were not on the zebra crossing. In Sri Lanka, drivers stop the moment a person steps on the zebra crossing. Motorists here must learn from those examples.

However, pedestrians are also lazy and don’t want to walk a few metres to the nearest signal or zebra crossing or even use underpasses and footbridges. In Abu Dhabi we see them darting across the road through gaps created in the median fences by unscrupulous elements. They only know why they want to put their lives in danger.

S Subramoniam, Abu Dhabi

Don’t feel sorry for vegans

Vegans deserve zero sympathy (Veganism will gain popularity once myths are broken, November 10).

They need to first stop talking about being vegans. Do the rest of us go around every day rambling on about how we eat everything?

Abraham Bob, Dubai

The article was interesting. I can think of a lot of reasons why vegans should be free to eat how they like and there is no reason why anyone should care if they do.

Kight Pruszynski, Abu Dhabi

A false sense of optimism

The article Oil to bounce back next year, predicts UAE energy minister (November 3) gives a false sense of optimism as it implies that oil price will regain its $100 (Dh367) a barrel value. If it does recover, it will be around the $58 to $60 mark. I agree that shale production is falling as we see the rig count reduce by almost 50 per cent and the big IOCs cut some $180bn in capex budgets.

However, let’s not forget that Opec is producing 2 million bpd in excess of its quota as Saudi Arabia attempts to hold on to market share. Opec’s monthly oil market report has downgraded growth for both China and India, two of the largest consumers of oil in Asia, while OECD growth remains more or less constant at 2 per cent.

If there is going to be a price recovery, it will have to come from the supply side and not demand.

The bottom line is that Opec must cut production if there is going to be any substantial movement in the price. But I suspect this will not occur until 2017. The unintended consequence of low oil prices is to drive high cost producers out of business.

Opec forecasts oil prices to reach $80 by 2020 and I don’t believe the Gulf nations will continue to dip into their sovereign wealth funds for another three years.

At current expenditure, Saudi Arabia has enough cover for five years before exhausting its savings.

Randall Mohammed, Dubai