Abstract

one of the biggest Difficulties for the young emeriti men is the weddings expenses along with the expensive dowries that make it harder for young men to go for marriage at an earlier age.

Grooms are forced to spend hundreds of thousands of Dhs to make weddings that can be made with 10% of the amount that are paid and dowries sometimes can reach hundreds of thousands and that makes it much harder for young men to walk into marriage

Table Of Contents

Cover Page .......................................................................................... 1
Abstract.................................................................................................2
Contents ................................................................................................3

Chapter 1
Introduction ...........................................................................................3
Background ............................................................................................

Chapter 2
Review Of literature..............................................................................

Chapter 3

Research methodology..........................................................................
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refrences ...............................................................................................
Appendix ..............................................................................................

in the national News paper there was a article ( Keep dowries and wedding costs down, couples urged )
Zoi Constantine
May 29, 2010

"However, we would like to observe that wedding costs must be kept moderate. Some people require vast amounts be spent on lavish ceremonies and this is unacceptable. We advise young men to set aside reasonable budgets for wedding ceremonies." Some grooms are being asked to give amounts exceeding Dh150,000 (US$40,000) for the mahhar, or dowry. Sometimes the bride can keep the entire amount, but more commonly at least part of the money goes towards covering some of her wedding costs.

wedding are time for happiness and bless but with the escalading financial attachments its becoming burden to many young emeriti men dowries are suppose to be an amount of money paid to the father of the girl for the preparations of the wedding but between 1985 an now it has been paid for showing purposes. this problem has became very prominent in the government in 1990 that sheikh zayed ben sultan has issued a series of rules to fight this issue first the amount was limited as a dowry to Dh20,000, with a further Dh30,000 set aside in the event that the marriage ends in divorce. A maximum of Dh20,000 is listed on the marriage certificate, but families often set their own dowry amounts. However, experts say that it is not only the high dowries that are putting pressure on young couples. The often prohibitive costs of a wedding is leading to domestic strife before they have even moved in together.

The Marriage Fund, which provides marriage grants and sponsors group weddings for Emiratis, has recently started to look into young Emiratis' perceptions of marriage and to stress the responsibilities that come with tying the knot. The Fund had organised seminars focusing on the costs associated with weddings, discouraging "extravagance", Dr al Shamsi said. "[It's] so that they don't take on their shoulders what they won't be able to handle," she said. "In the end, marriage is a partnership between two people, and everyone must work towards the success of that marriage."
Aisha al Suwaidi, the director general of the Dubai Women Establishment, believes that overspending on weddings has become a "dilemma". "Your feelings and values cannot be valued with money," she said. "We need to go back to our roots and values." According to Ahmed al Hammadi, the general manager of the Youth Centres run by the Sharjah Government, too many young marriages end in divorce because of problems brought on by financial burdens.
The Marriage Fund is also looking into the issue of the high divorce rate. Although there are no official statistics, recent estimates put the rate at over 30 per cent. "Young people have to be more realistic and not just expect what they see in romantic films," Mr al Hammadi said. "These young people need to learn about marriage and what they want and need, and how they can plan for their life and family. A marriage is not like a car, you can't just change it all the time."
Widad Lootah, a family adviser who has counselled young Emirati couples, also believes that the amount being spent on some weddings is "too high", leading to young couples ending up with massive amounts of debt at the beginning of their married lives. "Debts have an extremely negative impact, since couples will not be able to live a peaceful life," she said. However, while some families continue to spend great sums on weddings, others advocate a more reasonable approach. It is also not uncommon to hear of families asking for a symbolic amount or for the groom to perform a Quranic recitation for the dowry.
Some parents have been known to ask for nothing at all. Among them is Abu Rashid, an Emirati father from Ajman, who believes that he is not alone. "I didn't take a penny when my daughters married," he said. "If my daughter wanted to marry a man in debt she would sacrifice later on."

Emiratis are increasingly choosing to marry foreigners, new statistics show. The data from the Dubai Statistics Centre reveal that from 2007 through 2009, the number of marriages between Emiratis and foreigners rose 10 per cent to 539, while the number of marriages between two Emiratis dipped two per cent to 1,178. The figures, which are for Dubai only, are based on the annual report from Dubai Courts.
Topic
• Ministry of Social Affairs

Social experts have attributed the trend, which started in the 1980s, to the large dowries demanded by Emirati women. Sheikh Zayed, the founding President of the UAE, limited the official maximum dowry to Dh20,000 - but it can go as high as Dh800,000 in unofficial family agreements. "A lot of people in the UAE complain that families of the Emirati woman demand a large amount of dowry and a wedding in an expensive hotel," said Fawzya Taresh Rabee, the director of family development at the Ministry of Social Affairs. "So they end up opting for the foreigner."
Marrying an expatriate is believed to cost Emirati men a quarter of what they would spend on the dowry of an Emirati bride. However, they might not be banking on hidden costs that can accompany non-Emirati brides, Ms Rabee said. Those include bringing family to the Emirates and travelling back and forth to the woman's country of origin. "When the Emirati marries a local female, she will cost him a large amount of [money] and not just the amount recorded in the contract," said Abdelaziz al Hammadi, a Dubai Courts family counsellor. "So when we talk about the increase of expenses in marriage to [Emiratis], some of the youth perception is, 'I'll marry someone from the outside because the whole procedure will only cost me Dh10,000'."
The Marriage Fund has taken steps to encourage unions between nationals. "The strategic objectives of setting up the fund are to increase awareness of the composition of a healthy family and work to achieve stability in the community," said Habiba Mohammed, the fund's manager of guidance and family counselling. To encourage Emirati intermarriage, the fund can provide a grant to offset wedding costs, and it has also arranged affordable mass weddings.
UAE society has often viewed marriages between nationals and most foreigners as unusual and unacceptable. Still, the trend of nationals marrying foreigners is less likely to be seen as negative when it increases the Emirati population of the UAE, as nationals are in the minority. "The overall perception is that people reject it rather than accept it," Ms Rabee said. "Others look at it in a way that the number of the Emirati population is little, so why not increase the number of population through the right choice of marriage?"
Ms Rabee noted that marrying an Asian tends to be seen in a dim light while tying the knot with a woman from the Gulf region is better tolerated because of the similarity in cultural backgrounds. Still, mixed-nationality marriages do not generate many more divorces than unions between Emiratis. The statistics centre found that the divorce rate among Emiratis and non-Emiratis was 21 per cent, comparable to the 18 per cent among Emirati couples.
But if divorce does happen, it can be especially harrowing when one spouse calls another country home. Yasser Habeeb, an Emirati composer, went through an ordeal that lasted more than a decade to get his two children back after their Austrian mother took them to her homeland, claiming she was going to her sister's wedding. "After 13 years of fighting and keeping after the Austrian government and the kids, I finally got them two years and a half ago," he said. "Psychologically it destroyed me. I was lost for years and couldn't work and spent a lot of money from the bank. I was about to go to jail because of the debt."
Such a situation can compromise the social development of children from a mixed marriage, especially if they were not brought up in the right environment, said Nasser al Harbi, a psychologist at Dubai's Al Amal Hospital. "The child's personality development heavily depends on the way he was brought up, regardless of his parents' nationality," he said. "If he was brought up in a stable family, a safe environment and in a proper upbringing method in which his personal and social needs are met, it helps develop his personality. The opposite is also true."