The Middle East Economy

COMMUNICATIONS: The country code for the UAE is +971, followed by Dubai’s dialling code 04. There are two local telecoms providers, du and Etisalat. Pay as-you-go SIM cards can be obtained at most shopping malls upon presentation of a passport.

Kuwait is a member of both the Organisation of the Petroleum Exporting Countries and the GCC. Additionally, the country is arguably the most politically dynamic in the Gulf, which has afforded it strong foundations to help tackle recent issues concerning parliamentary elections and accountability. By continuing with economic diversification...

Since Saudi Arabia began reducing its domestic wheat production in 2008, the issue of food security has been high on the agenda for GCC governments. The Kingdom, which was once self-sufficient in the grain and even exported to the wider region, recognised something that is true across the whole of the Arabian Peninsula: it is quickly running...

With strong foreign reserves, a rapidly improving investment framework and a major state-led development programme under way, Kuwait is well positioned to attract growing levels of foreign direct investment (FDI) and trade in the coming years. While the government has cut back on current spending recently, capital expenditure has continued...

A combination of factors has led to a rise in bond issuances from GCC member states across the first half of 2016. Over the period, bonds and sukuk (Islamic bonds) issued in the GCC hit $39bn, accounting for 15% of the region’s total outstanding bonds ($263bn) as of June 2016, and nearly equalling the value of issues in the whole...

In January 2016 Kuwait announced plans to create a new fund to manage its domestic assets, signalling a key step forward in the push to privatise state-owned assets. While the state has experimented with privatisation in the past, the climate of significantly reduced oil prices, which reached a 12-year low in January 2016, has added a greater...