divimg alt="" src="http://hits.guardian.co.uk/b/ss/guardiangu-feeds/1/H.15.1/52950?ns=guardianpageName=World+news%3A+Downturn+hits+Dubai%27s+building+bonanzach=World+newsc3=The+Guardianc4=Dubai+%28News%29%2CMiddle+East+%28News%29%2CWorld+newsc5=Not+commercially+usefulc6=Ian+Blackc7=2008_12_05c8=1129180c9=articlec10=GUc11=World+newsc12=Dubaic13=c14=h2=GU%2FWorld+news%2FDubai" width="1" height="1" //divpDubai's multibillion-dollar building boom is grinding to a halt, with some of the Gulf emirate's most ambitious construction projects put under review as the global economic crisis hits home./ppMeraas, a government-owned developer, confirmed yesterday that it was looking again at the pace of its flagship $95bn (pound;64bn) Jumeirah Gardens project in the light of the worldwide downturn. /ppThe massive Dubailand hotel and leisure project, costed at $88bn, is also being reassessed, Khalid al-Malik, the chief executive of developer Tatweer, told the National newspaper in Abu Dhabi./ppAnalysts say falling oil prices and the rising cost of financing construction has forced Gulf developers to take stock, with Dubai forming a high-level government committee to prioritise projects./ppDubai was brazenly defying the credit crunch and plunging stock markets when the 12-year Jumeirah Gardens project was launched in October. The plans involved razing an entire district to make way for office and residential towers, a green area half the size of New York's Central Park and a canal system linked to the Arabian gulf./ppMeraas's original announcement of the project came hot on the heels of a plan by fellow state-owned developer Nakheel to build the world's tallest tower - more than 1km (3,280ft) high./ppIn six years of an oil-fuelled property boom, Dubai - the second largest member of the United Arab Emirates (UAE) - has earned the distinction of having 25% of all the cranes on earth and more buildings under construction than Shanghai./ppBut Dubai's stock market has lost close to 70% of its value since the summer. Two of the UAE's largest mortgage firms, Amlak Finance and Tamweel, were nationalised last week./pp"The bubble hasn't yet burst," said Christopher Davidson, a Gulf expert at Durham University. "Dubai's free zones, real estate and tourism are all highly susceptible to a global downturn. Real estate is the flagship and if confidence has been knocked, which it clearly has been, it's in trouble. Now the confidence has gone, credit worthiness has taken a knock."/ppNakheel, the developer of man-made palm tree-shaped islands on which celebrities such as David Beckham have bought homes, announced earlier this week that it had cut 500 jobs -15% of its workforce - and was scaling back projects. /ppThough thousands of expatriate professionals are expected to lose their jobs, Dubai's optimism may not be entirely misplaced. A survey by a leading financial services firm this week predicted that the Gulf as a whole would escape recession, with a growth rate of 3.6% next year./pdiv style="float: left; margin-right: 10px; margin-bottom: 10px;"ullia href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/dubai"Dubai/a/lilia href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/middleeast"Middle East/a/li/ul/diva href="http://www.guardian.co.uk"guardian.co.uk/a copy; Guardian News Media Limited 2008 | Use of this content is subject to our a href="http://users.guardian.co.uk/help/article/0,,933909,00.html"Terms Conditions/a | a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/webfeeds/1,,1309488,00.html"More Feeds/a pa href="http://feedads.googleadservices.com/~at/SxMF3IEKa_uUoDPq_BO9ko50Vyk/a"img src="http://feedads.googleadservices.com/~at/SxMF3IEKa_uUoDPq_BO9ko50Vyk/i" border="0" ismap="true"/img/a/p