Saudi raises its non-petroleum exports by 13% in 2010

Increase in the non-petroleum exports reflects the qualification of resources management and its returns in the Gulf

The development plans that the oil countries use – headed by the gulf countries – led to successfully raising the values of the direct exports and re-exporting values by a high rate despite that a lot of economies still did not recover from the financial crisis according to the weekly energy report of the Hilal Petroleum Company in UAE.
The report pointed that the United Arab Emirates achieved a growth of around 12% in its non-petroleum exports in 2010, while the industrial sector is experiencing more focus in the recorded strategic plans on the structure of the strategic exports. On the other hand, Saudi succeeded in increasing its non-petroleum exports by 13% in 2010 and they are expecting a similar percentage by the end of the current year, while the petroleum exports increased by 24.6% in 2010. The Saudi Ministry of Economy and Planning expected a decrease of the contribution of oil and gas in the structure of exports by 20% until the year 2024 according to the approved strategic plan, which will push the non-petroleum exports to around 80% in the same period.
Because of that, the direction of enhancing the exports in general must be a leading priority for the petroleum countries, while the structure of these exports and the partial importance of each one of them from the total exports is in the 2nd level in importance, because the presence of plans to increase the exports will depend on the availability of resources that should be invested and used in an ideal way. Moreover, an attractive investment environment should be available with a bundle of regulations and rules that attract investments and support its continuity and development on the middle and long run. This means that qualifications and expertise should be available to go ahead in developing the production economic sectors, because these factors together form the general frame through which will make it possible to measure the success or failure of the countries in changing from importing countries to exporting and producing countries, and an indication also on measuring its abilities to scarce those exports and not depend on limited income sources.
Diversification of the production and distribution spectrum of the exports structure became a basic requirement to achieve financial and economic stability for a country, because exporting one good like oil or gas will make the economy more exposed to dangers of the sharp and continuous price changes of oil and gas in the global market and what it results of side effects on the quality of executing the development plans, government spending plans, surplus or disability of the business balance with the outside. These directions indicate the importance for these countries to continuously focus on increasing their petroleum and non-petroleum exports as much as they can, because that means a bigger ability to invest the incomes of the strategic production sectors it has such as oil, gas and the other main sectors and a bigger evidence on the ability of these countries to gain an advanced position on the international map of production and exporting. This means a higher importance on the level of attracting investments, nationalizing and developing the industries as well as more participation and influence in all financial and economic international events and developments.
Photo explanation: the direction towards enhancing the exports must be a leading priority for the oil countries.