Bahrain Real Estate Investment (Edamah), a unit of Bahrain’s sovereign wealth fund Mumtalakat, plans to develop a tourism project in the Hawar Islands area of the country.

The one million square metre project will be developed in the Northern Dihat area in Hawar Island, although no further details have been released.

Local media reports have said the scheme is part of the government’s bid to develop Hawar Islands into an attractive investment area, as efforts to diversify the economy continue amid falling oil prices.

The government has been taking a number of steps to help boost the country’s real estate market. The resumption of many stalled projects has also given developers confidence that the authorities are committed to supporting the market. Projects such as the Villamar development, the Amwaj Gateway Towers, Marina West and Riffa Views have all been earmarked for accelerated completion.

Meanwhile, as the slump in oil prices impacts Bahrain’s wider economy, analysts fear a short-term slump in both the residential and commercial market leading up to the end of 2015.

Despite this, the rhetoric coming from Bahrain has been a positive one. Analysts and government officials have told MEED that the fiscal and macro-economic policy moving forward will be one that pushes the private sector in order to diversify the economy and stimulate growth.