Oman

A decade of rapid development in Oman has seen the sultanate’s population jump, while rising industrialisation and new construction projects have bolstered economic diversification under the Vision 2020 economic development plan. This has not come without costs, however, and natural gas consumption has sky-rocketed in recent years, driven by heavy new demand in the...

The sultanate’s geographic position on the Arabian Peninsula, in close proximity to the Arabian Gulf and the Gulf of Oman, but outside the Strait of Hormuz, has given it the region’s best access to one of the world’s most important energy corridors. Following several years of declining output in the 2000s, plans are under way to increase crude oil production, and the...

Over the past 10 years, Oman’s maturing oilfields have increasingly relied on enhanced oil recovery (EOR) technologies, which have seen current production return close to levels not witnessed in 15 years. With EOR expected to comprise a quarter of state-owned Petroleum Development Oman’s (PDO) total oil production by 2020, the sultanate has seen natural gas usage in...

In 2013 and the first half of 2014, Oman’s takaful (Islamic insurance) segment moved to the forefront of the wider insurance industry. While sharia-compliant financial products have been allowed in the country since 2011, sharia-compliant underwriting was officially sanctioned only in 2013, and the first takaful firms did not begin the process of setting up shop until...