TAG: Saudi Arabia
Saudi Arabia's response to the Covid-19 pandemic has been aided by solid fundamentals, proactive containment and mitigation policies, and an increasingly vibrant digital economy. While exploring the holistic response of policymakers to the challenges, this latest report also focuses on how the national payment infrastructure was able to support a rapid shift towards digital payments, and looks at whether the transition towards a cashless society has been accelerated.
The city of Medina plays an important role in the cultural and historical make-up of Saudi Arabia. It is the final resting place of the Prophet Muhammad and is home to the Prophet’s Mosque, which the Prophet helped build after his flight from Makkah in 622 AD. Today, the Prophet’s Mosque is one of the largest mosque in the world and is the second-holiest site in Islam after the Great Mosque in Makkah. As such, Medina is an important religious centre for the world’s 1.9bn Muslims, with millions of pilgrims visiting the city and its holy sites annually. Saudi Arabia’s far-reaching development strategy, Vision 2030, has earmarked tourism – specifically Islamic heritage tourism – as an engine for growth in the Kingdom’s non-oil economy, with Medina set to play a central role in these efforts.
Saudi Arabia’s investment in health care infrastructure in recent years has enabled the kingdom to navigate the early health care challenges associated with Covid-19 while its ample financial buffers and strong sovereign credit rating have allowed it to plug temporary revenue shortfalls resulting from the economic slowdown and collapse in global energy demand.