The UAE Minister of State, Reem Al-Hashimy, pledged $30 million to Queensland during a visit by Gulf country business representatives to Brisbane on Monday.
She said she had watched the destruction done to Queensland by flooding and Cyclone Yasi earlier this year.
"We wish to support your can-do attitude, your ability to pick yourselves up and get on with it," Ms Al-Hashimy told reporters.
News that makes sense
Your trusted source for staying up-to-date with the world around you. Get free daily news updates and analysis, straight to your inbox.
Premier Anna Bligh immediately matched the donation, declaring the new shelters would provide protection for more than 500 people each from 300km/h winds, windborne debris and storm tide inundation.
The state government came under pressure following January's category five Cyclone Yasi for not having built enough cyclone shelters, despite promising them in communities from Bundaberg to Cooktown.
Four have been completed since former premier Peter Beattie made the promise after category four Cyclone Larry ravaged Innisfail in 2006.
The government was criticised for working too slowly to fulfil its commitment.
But the new funds mean construction will now begin by the year's end, Ms Bligh said on Monday.
She said locations had not yet been chosen.
However, they would likely include Cairns, Townsville, the Cassowary Coast, Proserpine/Airlie Beach, Mackay/Sarina, Yeppoon/Rockhampton and Weipa.
"This donation from Abu Dhabi is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity for us to do something in two years that might have otherwise taken 20 years," Ms Bligh told reporters.
She said the gesture was an extremely generous and unsolicited gift.
"It says something very powerful about our relationship with our trading partners that they are not just trade relationships, they are friendship relationships," she said.
"... This is what friends do for each other."
The premier said Abu Dhabi had chosen which project its money would be used for from several proposed by the government.
Opposition community safety spokesman John-Paul Langbroek said it was incredible that Abu Dhabi would help fund the shelters.
"Thank God for Abu Dhabi and its $30 million pledge," Mr Langbroek said in a statement.
"It's very generous and very welcome given the fact that more than five years after state Labor promised shelters for major coast centres, only a couple have been built."
