What history tells us about Saudi Arabia's 2030 plan

In some ways he was an historical precursor to Mohammed bin Salman, today's deputy crown prince. Indeed, a new wave of young, business-orientated officials has been empowered over the past couple of years

Saudi Arabia's Vision 2030 is helping the country address the challenging mission of freeing itself of its dependency on oil revenues. This ambition has been a repetitive theme of the kingdom's development plans since 1975. 

Those who doubt Saudi Arabia’s capabilities to deliver something quite so substantial by 2030 should not forget what happened more than 40 years ago. 
In December 1974, my family assets were a small house in the coastal city of Jeddah and a barely functioning Toyota sedan. By the mid-1980s, my father bought a brand new GMC Suburban shortly after finishing two beautiful buildings beside our house, which was given to us free of charge, as he was a member of the armed forces. 
It was not only my family who went through this class transition, but also a generation of Saudi families who became today’s middle class. 
I maintain that in 1975 the government had a vision to establish the modern state of Saudi Arabia, which required massive infrastructure projects and the empowerment of the Saudi people. 
The state successfully delivered a vision of cement and education in just a decade. 
Behind the 1975 vision was the dynamic, progressive Crown Prince Fahd bin Abdulaziz. He empowered a cadre of western-educated ambitious young men, who radically reformed the state bureaucracy.  In some ways he was an historical precursor to Mohammed bin Salman, today's deputy crown prince. Indeed, a new wave of young, business-orientated officials has been empowered over the past couple of years. 
In 1975, Prince Fahd formed six new ministries – electricity and industry, housing, higher education, telecommunication, municipality and rural affairs, and planning – and appointed talented technocrats, such as Ghazi Al Gosaibi, Saud Al Faisal and others to lead government entities. The number of civil servants rocketed from 97,000 in the early 1970s to 350,000 by the mid-1980s. During this golden decade of prosperity, the population doubled to 14 million.
The three dimensions of development – housing, industry, and agriculture – were represented by massive funds addressing these fronts. 
By the mid-1980s, the state had successfully built more than 100,000 and had generously allocated interest-free loans for thousands of citizens across the country. 
In 1978, The New York Times published a story about King Saud University’s continuing plan to become the Middle East’s MIT and to house a library comparable to Stanford University's impressive facilities. Women’s education was another focus. In the early 1970s, literacy rates among women stood at just 2 per cent before jumping to 50 per cent during the following few years. 
These notable years were full of almost unthinkable top-down initiatives: from building a solar farm north of Riyadh and an eye-opening plan to pull icebergs from Antarctica to Saudi coasts (an idea that has recently been mooted again in this region), to progressively exploring the "going nuclear" option. The government, Riyadh has stated, "will encourage the non-profit sector to apply proper governance standards, facilitate high quality training to staff and promote a culture of volunteering and full-time careers in the sector" – as part of its push to tackle unemployment through this hitherto under-utilised avenue. How to implement the plan is more complex.
The Vision 2030 transcript splits its forward-planning ecosystem into the traditional three main sectors: the government; the private sector; and the non-profit sector. Foundations, cultural groups and health clubs, for instance, are also referred to within this third space, indicating that all organisations that have any influence in benefiting societal or environmental well-being are to be involved, including those that do not have a purely profitmaking agenda.
The key idea, suggests Asya Alashaikh, the chief executive of Tamkeen Holdings (formerly TamkeenCSR), is for the non-profit sector to step up and contribute more by playing a role in tackling the very real issues the country is facing, such as health care, education, employability, youth character development and special needs. Also included is improving transparency and corporate sustainability, as is the case, says Ms Alashaikh’s, with her company, which works with clients to develop the principles of corporate social responsibility (CSR) and sustainability into their core strategies. 
Non-profit is a major plank of the vision. "The government in Saudi Arabia, in its Vision 2030, articulates clear targets for the development of non-profit organisations," Ahmad Telfah, the chief economist at Riyad Bank tells The National. "Currently there are about 1,000 non-profit organisations in the kingdom – less than 10 per cent of them are seen as contributing to the long-term growth of the country. The government’s objective is to improve the performance, efficiency and transparency of non-profit organisations to increase their benefit for GDP.
"The government is currently in a process to adopt different initiatives to increase the impact of non-profit organisations in economic activities," Mr Telfah says. The ability for organisations to now gain a licence to operate as a non-profit has also opened up more opportunities for entrepreneurial creativity. While traditional foundations, such as the King Khalid Foundation, continue their work on the ground, social enterprises are also dotting the landscape now. The wheels were set in motion after the Shura Council, similar to a parliament, passed a law paving the way for civil society organisations to operate in the kingdom at the end of 2015.
"The approval of this law is a significant milestone for the country, especially those who were trying to serve as the third sector," says Ms Alashaikh, who counts her company as among this group. She estimates that since November 2015, when the cabinet approved the law, several hundred non-profit organisations or social interest groups have sprung up, encouraged by the new legislation. Ms Alashaikh also served as a consultant to the Shura Council, from 2010 to 2014 – before women officially became a part of the consultative body. For the past decade she has been working for sustainable development in the kingdom and now plans to register her firm’s Tamkeen Foundation as a non-profit. In 1976, Saudi Arabia Basic Industries Corporation was born as groups of engineers and business graduates, and convinced Prince Fahd to build two industrial cities in the middle of the desert. Youth are a central feature of Saudi Vision 2030, just as they were in 1975. 
Prince Fahd appointed his eldest son, Prince Faisal, to head the newly formed General Presidency of Youth Welfare with a budget that increased from $38 million in 1975 to $800 million in 1983. 
That resulted in a network of state-of-the-art stadiums in almost every major city, not to mention winning the Asia Football Cup in 1984 and 1988. 
Football fans in the kingdom will hope that Vision 2030 stirs similar successes this time around. 

The writer is an analyst and journalist in Abu Dhabi

What history tells us about Saudi Arabias 2030 plan

In some ways he was an historical precursor to Mohammed bin Salman, todays deputy crown prince. Indeed, a new wave of young, business-orientated officials has been empowered over the past couple of years

Saudi Arabias Vision 2030 is helping the country address the challenging mission of freeing itself of its dependency on oil revenues. This ambition has been a repetitive theme of the kingdoms development plans since 1975. Those who doubt Saudi Arabias capabilities to deliver something quite so substantial by 2030 should not forget what happened more than 40 years ago. In December 1974, my family assets were a small house in the coastal city of Jeddah and a barely functioning Toyota sedan. By the mid-1980s, my father bought a brand new GMC Suburban shortly after finishing two beautiful buildings beside our house, which was given to us free of charge, as he was a member of the armed forces. It was not only my family who went through this class transition, but also a generation of Saudi families who became todays middle class. I maintain that in 1975 the government had a vision to establish the modern state of Saudi Arabia, which required massive infrastructure projects and the empowerment of the Saudi people. The state successfully delivered a vision of cement and education in just a decade. Behind the 1975 vision was the dynamic, progressive Crown Prince Fahd bin Abdulaziz. He empowered a cadre of western-educated ambitious young men, who radically reformed the state bureaucracy. In some ways he was an historical precursor to Mohammed bin Salman, todays deputy crown prince. Indeed, a new wave of young, business-orientated officials has been empowered over the past couple of years. In 1975, Prince Fahd formed six new ministries electricity and industry, housing, higher education, telecommunication, municipality and rural affairs, and planning and appointed talented technocrats, such as Ghazi Al Gosaibi, Saud Al Faisal and others to lead government entities. The number of civil servants rocketed from 97,000 in the early 1970s to 350,000 by the mid-1980s. During this golden decade of prosperity, the population doubled to 14 million. The three dimensions of development housing, industry, and agriculture were represented by massive funds addressing these fronts. By the mid-1980s, the state had successfully built more than 100,000 and had generously allocated interest-free loans for thousands of citizens across the country. In 1978, The New York Times published a story about King Saud Universitys continuing plan to become the Middle Easts MIT and to house a library comparable to Stanford Universitys impressive facilities. Womens education was another focus. In the early 1970s, literacy rates among women stood at just 2 per cent before jumping to 50 per cent during the following few years. These notable years were full of almost unthinkable top-down initiatives: from building a solar farm north of Riyadh and an eye-opening plan to pull icebergs from Antarctica to Saudi coasts (an idea that has recently been mooted again in this region), to progressively exploring the going nuclear option. The government, Riyadh has stated, will encourage the non-profit sector to apply proper governance standards, facilitate high quality training to staff and promote a culture of volunteering and full-time careers in the sector as part of its push to tackle unemployment through this hitherto under-utilised avenue. How to implement the plan is more complex. The Vision 2030 transcript splits its forward-planning ecosystem into the traditional three main sectors: the government; the private sector; and the non-profit sector. Foundations, cultural groups and health clubs, for instance, are also referred to within this third space, indicating that all organisations that have any influence in benefiting societal or environmental well-being are to be involved, including those that do not have a purely profitmaking agenda. The key idea, suggests Asya Alashaikh, the chief executive of Tamkeen Holdings (formerly TamkeenCSR), is for the non-profit sector to step up and contribute more by playing a role in tackling the very real issues the country is facing, such as health care, education, employability, youth character development and special needs. Also included is improving transparency and corporate sustainability, as is the case, says Ms Alashaikhs, with her company, which works with clients to develop the principles of corporate social responsibility (CSR) and sustainability into their core strategies. Non-profit is a major plank of the vision. The government in Saudi Arabia, in its Vision 2030, articulates clear targets for the development of non-profit organisations, Ahmad Telfah, the chief economist at Riyad Bank tells The National. Currently there are about 1,000 non-profit organisations in the kingdom less than 10 per cent of them are seen as contributing to the long-term growth of the country. The governments objective is to improve the performance, efficiency and transparency of non-profit organisations to increase their benefit for GDP. The government is currently in a process to adopt different initiatives to increase the impact of non-profit organisations in economic activities, Mr Telfah says. The ability for organisations to now gain a licence to operate as a non-profit has also opened up more opportunities for entrepreneurial creativity. While traditional foundations, such as the King Khalid Foundation, continue their work on the ground, social enterprises are also dotting the landscape now. The wheels were set in motion after the Shura Council, similar to a parliament, passed a law paving the way for civil society organisations to operate in the kingdom at the end of 2015. The approval of this law is a significant milestone for the country, especially those who were trying to serve as the third sector, says Ms Alashaikh, who counts her company as among this group. She estimates that since November 2015, when the cabinet approved the law, several hundred non-profit organisations or social interest groups have sprung up, encouraged by the new legislation. Ms Alashaikh also served as a consultant to the Shura Council, from 2010 to 2014 before women officially became a part of the consultative body. For the past decade she has been working for sustainable development in the kingdom and now plans to register her firms Tamkeen Foundation as a non-profit. In 1976, Saudi Arabia Basic Industries Corporation was born as groups of engineers and business graduates, and convinced Prince Fahd to build two industrial cities in the middle of the desert. Youth are a central feature of Saudi Vision 2030, just as they were in 1975. Prince Fahd appointed his eldest son, Prince Faisal, to head the newly formed General Presidency of Youth Welfare with a budget that increased from $38 million in 1975 to $800 million in 1983. That resulted in a network of state-of-the-art stadiums in almost every major city, not to mention winning the Asia Football Cup in 1984 and 1988. Football fans in the kingdom will hope that Vision 2030 stirs similar successes this time around. The writer is an analyst andjournalist in Abu Dhabi