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A luxurious commodity, now available at a price easier to swallow. At Petrossian Caviar restaurant in Dubai, guest Anita Attieh from Lebanon is getting her teeth into a once exclusive delicacy. She used to be one of many consumers who were priced out of the market, it's a trend now beginning to change. "I tried caviar for the first time about five years ago," she says. "I enjoy caviar for the taste and the way it is presented, that is what I like most." This restaurant - which specialises in caviar and gourmet foodstuffs - opened in April 2013 at Dubai's largest mall, frequented by millions of shoppers. Chef Saber Moufakkir plates thousands of dollars worth of caviar each day. He says there's been a steady increase in demand for caviar, perhaps because of it's wider availability. "Well we do have all, all the nationalities like Arabic, European, Indian, American, everybody is coming to eat caviar," he says. "Everyone now is eating caviar and it's in everyone's hand." While there's no specific statistics on consumption of caviar in the UAE, those in the industry say that with its booming tourist economy and large expatriate community, the demand for caviar has grown exponentially along with profits. That new-found access to caviar is thanks to producers such as Emirates Aquatech, a sturgeon farm and caviar processing facility. Here, workers handle tens of thousands of dollars worth of beluga caviar each day, they jokingly call it 'black gold'. That's while others monitor dozens of basketball court-length water tanks, the home to hundreds of thousands of egg-producing sturgeon fish. Unlike the majority of the world's caviar producing facilities, this complex is not on the shores of the Caspian or the rivers of Siberia, but in the Emirate of Abu Dhabi. With trade in wild caviar banned in 2006, there's since been a gradual surge in acceptance for these farms from connoisseurs around the globe. That acceptance and growing demand led Ahmed Bin Salem Al Dhaheri, the founder of Emirates Aquatech, to build this; the world's largest indoor caviar producing sturgeon farm in Abu Dhabi with the hopes of capitalising on demand. "With the UAE and the region growing in terms of economy and population, there's a growing demand on the caviar here as well not only in other parts of the world but here in this region, this country, there is demand for the caviar," he says. A kilo of wild caviar can cost upwards of $25,000 USD where as farm-raised varieties like that of Emirates Aquatech start from around $2,500; just 10 percent of the price. That's making it a delicacy accessible to a much wider market. The idea of constructing a sturgeon farm and caviar processing facility in the Gulf was at first greeted with scepticism given the UAE's vast desert and scorching heat. It hits over 40 degrees celsius here - a departure from the cooler caviar-producing water of the Caspian Sea. But Al Dhaheri says that scepticism is misplaced. "When we started building, announcing the project to the world from here in Abu Dhabi, people thought that this really wasn't the ideal place for such a project," he says. "People thought that this project can only be in places where cold weather is that is suitable for the fish. No wrong." The dozens of water basins which line this sprawling industrial complex are monitored by a team of engineers. The roar of the automated feeding system - programmed to feed the stock by computer - overpowers the sound of water recirculating inside the tanks. They ensure the home to hundreds of thousands of fish remains at a habitable temperature for years to come so they can reach maturity, despite the scorching Abu Dhabi heat. All raised, harvested, and packed here in the UAE. You can license this story through AP Archive: http://www.aparchive.com/metadata/youtube/165149a3bf8eb5e0534111b5c5b01ca1 Find out more about AP Archive: http://www.aparchive.com/HowWeWork