Saudi Arabia: Exploring away from oil

At an economic forum in Saudi Arabia, delegates mill around a model city, admiring its ultramodern, dome-shaped sports stadium, yachts sailing in the estuary, luxurious villas looking out over the Red Sea and a huge state-of-the-art port decked out with shore cranes.

“Welcome to the city that embraces the future,” a voice booms in a nearby conference room, where four video screens broadcast computer-generated images of the King Abdullah “economic city”.

The $26.7 billion (13.6 billion pounds) project is the largest single investment in Saudi Arabia and is the showpiece of the government’s efforts to diversify its economy.
Five other similar cities are planned in different regions of the kingdom, as it attempts to utilise its extraordinary oil boom to spur private-sector growth and create industry where today there is only desert.

Get it right and it would have far-reaching implications for the development of the conservative kingdom, helping stabilise the economy and lessen the shocks of oil slumps.

Gulf News