Traditional sports in the United Arab Emirates

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United Arab Emirates, an Islamic and Arabic country in the Middle East, was established in 1971 by the enormous efforts of its leaders. Despite its relatively short existence, it has devolved its own unique traditions and costumes that are distinguished from the nearby countries.

One of UAE's oldest tradition is falconry and it dates to past times. It is not known exactly when falconry emerged but some historians believe that it dates back 2000 years.^{[citation needed]} Falconry was originally practiced as a source for food, to hunt hares and houbara mostly. In addition to that, it was considered a way of life for leaders of the tribe and the rest of the tribe; it was undertaken during daylight hours and later on it was the topic of discussion at evening get-togethers. Furthermore, there was another companion that went hand in hand with falcons, which was the saluki hunting dog. These were mainly for hunting down gazelles.

It requires a deal of patience, skill and courage to tame, capture and train a falcon. To protect this traditional sport and also to make sure that falcons were treated properly, a number of laws were laid down. The idea of placing trackers under each falcon's skin with a unique identification numbers was established by the Emirates Bird Society. This will help a great deal in tracking down the patterns of falcon's migration and will open new possibilities of preserving this unique breed. A few years ago, an idea to issue passports to these birds was undertaken and was aimed at checking the illegal trade of falcons.

Today, falconry is an endangered branch of Dubai's rich cultural legacy. Rapid urbanization in the UAE over the last few years has adversely affected the natural habitat of the falcons. Moreover, new falconers do not respect the codes of practicing this sport and also indulge in over-hunting. This has posed a threat to these beautiful birds as well as to the cultural offshoot of the game itself.

In order to preserve this sport for posterity's sake, the UAE government is working in collaboration with UNESCO for imbuing falconry with the status of a cultural heritage across the globe and attracting more Dubai holiday makers for this reason. Unesco ^[1] has taken the task to revive and promote the Traditional Sports and Games by creating the Ad-hoc Advisory Committee(AAC) and elected its Chairman Mr. Khalil Ahmed Khan an expert of TSG, who is also the President of the International Association of Traditional Wrestling Sports (IATWS) and Shammi Rana as Rapporteur Ad Hoc Advisory Committee Traditional Sports & Games,UNESCO.^[2]