After being a political leper, the global energy crisis made Mohammed bin Salman a reborn leader
The Crown Prince of Saudi Arabia, Mohammed bin Salman, is continuing his renewed legitimization process, this time with his arrival at the G20 summit meeting this week in Bali, Indonesia.
Even before the current crisis, Saudi Arabia was already in the process of looking for new alliances, mainly in the East. The Saudis have expressed their desire to join the BRICS group of countries, which accounts for a quarter of global GDP and 16% of international trade. This step is intended, first and foremost, to strengthen Saudi Arabia’s economic ties with China – and it seems that the more relations with Washington cool, the stronger they will become with Beijing. Jing.
Financially, bin Salman arrives in Bali as a winner. The performance of the Saudi economy this year is one of the best among the 20 strongest economies in the world. According to official data, in the third quarter the local economy grew by 8.6%, the highest figure among the G20. At the same time, the inflation rate amounted to 2.9%, one of the lowest among the G20 countries. Saudi Arabia’s budget surplus in the third quarter reached $3.76 billion.
What drives the Saudi economy are the oil revenues, which reach an annual rate of about 250 billion dollars, but they create a positive effect on the other sectors of the economy. During the third quarter, the non-oil sector registered an impressive growth of about 6%. Even in the field of foreign trade, Bin Salman comes with a nice achievement. The Kingdom’s trade surplus rose to approximately 19 billion dollars, as of the end of August 2022, a figure that represents an 87% jump compared to the same period last year. This increase is occurring despite ongoing difficulties in global supply chains. Since the beginning of the year, Saudi exports to China, Japan and the USA have indeed grown, but the two markets that recorded the largest increase in imports from Saudi Arabia were India and South Korea.
The writer is the manager of the Concord company, www.cocordmena.com