GAM’s Amman opportunities draw investor attention

AMMAN — Since the Greater Amman Municipality (GAM) officially launched its Amman Vision Investment and Development Company (AVID) on January 18, 55 investors have expressed interest in its investment opportunities, especially in its motor city and exhibition projects, according to the company’s CEO. 

“AVID promotes and facilitates a conducive investment environment aimed at underpinning sustainable development and bringing about a diversified assets portfolio,”  the company’s CEO Hamzah Haj Hasan told The Jordan Times during a telephone interview on Thursday. 

What makes AVID “unique”, he said, is its “distinguished” approach to progress, establishing an investment road map for each interested investor and understanding the market’s needs and opportunities.

With the aim of increasing GAM’s revenues using non-traditional methods, the company has taken advantage of the municipality’s unutilised assets valued at approximately $2 billion, Haj Hasan noted, adding that GAM owns more than 4,500 properties, of which 1,000 offer diverse investment potential.

During the launch event in January, AVID unveiled its first batch of eight investment opportunities, including automated car parking, a motor city, an exhibition centre, a banking district, smart on-street parking, a mini box park and the Ghamadan project, which will either focus on recreation or housing, he said.

Focusing on long-term value investments, the company works to provide new engines of local growth and profitability by offering customised, readily accessible and transparent contract methods to local and foreign investors, according to the CEO.

The company, he said, offers a “wide range of investment methods”, including long-term lease contracts of up to 30 years, investment contracts based on profit and revenue share and public-private partnership contracts in predesigned projects, with the availability of Build-Operate-Transfer and Build-Own-Operate-Transfer models and infrastructure-project contracts.

Functioning as GAM’s master developer and investment arm, AVID “enhances the city’s investment inflows, generates maximum development advantages and stimulates new businesses”, Haj Hasan said.

“AVID’s concrete objectives step towards boosting Jordan’s economy, strengthening employment potentials and portraying Amman’s attractiveness to investors through offering them a set of GAM-owned land assets which cater to their budgets, with the aim of enabling all people to be part of Amman’s growth path,” he noted.