Coral Bloom, an International Tourism Destination on the Red Sea

The Coral Bloom project will revitalize the Red Sea region due to its designs inspired by beautiful landscapes and wildlife. (SPA)
The Coral Bloom project will revitalize the Red Sea region due to its designs inspired by beautiful landscapes and wildlife. (SPA)
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Coral Bloom, an International Tourism Destination on the Red Sea

The Coral Bloom project will revitalize the Red Sea region due to its designs inspired by beautiful landscapes and wildlife. (SPA)
The Coral Bloom project will revitalize the Red Sea region due to its designs inspired by beautiful landscapes and wildlife. (SPA)

With the announcement by Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman of a giant tourism project in the west of the Kingdom, experts told Asharq Al-Awsat that the Coral Bloom project would be able to revitalize the Red Sea region due to its designs inspired by beautiful landscapes and wildlife.

The Kingdom is heading towards an unprecedented tourism boom, according to the experts, following the recent announcement of a number of major projects. The Coral Bloom comes to activate the first investment in tourism on offshore islands in the country, they underlined.

The hotels and resorts will be operated by the most prestigious international hotel brands, while lightweight building materials with low thermal mass will be used, thus achieving higher energy efficiency and less impact on the environment.

The project responds to the concerns of visitors in wake of the Covid-19 pandemic, by providing wider spaces between hotels, villas and internal corridors.

The Red Sea Project will be developed as a luxury tourist destination that stretches over an area of 28,000 km, and includes more than 90 islands spread over an attractive coastline, characterized by soft white sands, dormant volcanoes, desert, mountains and stunning nature, in addition to distinctive cultural attractions.

The CEO of the Red Sea Development Company, John Pagano, said in recent statements that the estimated cost of the project ranged between 12 and 14 billion riyals (USD 3.7 billion).

The Coral Bloom will include 11 resorts and hotels operated by a number of the most famous global hospitality brands. All the hotels and villas will be composed of a one-story building, which will merge sand dunes, in order to ensure the preservation of the surrounding landscape without any obstruction to the magnificent view on the Red Sea.



WTO Slashes 2025 Trade Growth Forecast

Chinese made cars, including Volvo and other brands, are seen at the port in Nanjing, in China's eastern Jiangsu province on April 16, 2025, as they wait to be loaded onto ships for export. (Photo by AFP)
Chinese made cars, including Volvo and other brands, are seen at the port in Nanjing, in China's eastern Jiangsu province on April 16, 2025, as they wait to be loaded onto ships for export. (Photo by AFP)
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WTO Slashes 2025 Trade Growth Forecast

Chinese made cars, including Volvo and other brands, are seen at the port in Nanjing, in China's eastern Jiangsu province on April 16, 2025, as they wait to be loaded onto ships for export. (Photo by AFP)
Chinese made cars, including Volvo and other brands, are seen at the port in Nanjing, in China's eastern Jiangsu province on April 16, 2025, as they wait to be loaded onto ships for export. (Photo by AFP)

The World Trade Organization sharply cut its forecast for global merchandise trade from solid growth to a decline on Wednesday, saying further US tariffs and spillover effects could lead to the heaviest slump since the height of the COVID pandemic.
The WTO said it expected trade in goods to fall by 0.2% this year, down from its expectation in October of 3.0% expansion. It said its new estimate was based on measures in place at the start of this week, Reuters reported.
US President Donald Trump imposed extra duties on steel and car imports as well as more sweeping global tariffs before unexpectedly pausing higher duties on a dozen economies. His trade war with China has also intensified with tit-for-tat exchanges pushing levies on each other's imports beyond 100%.
The WTO said that, if Trump reintroduced the full rates of his broader tariffs that would reduce goods trade growth by 0.6 percentage points, with another 0.8 point cut due to spillover effects beyond US-linked trade.
Taken together, this would lead to a 1.5% decline, the steepest drop since 2020.
"The unprecedented nature of the recent trade policy shifts means that predictions should be interpreted with more caution than usual," said the WTO, which is also forecasting a modest recovery of 2.5% in 2026.
Earlier on Wednesday, the UN Trade and Development (UNCTAD) agency said global economic growth could slow to 2.3% as trade tensions and uncertainty drive a recessionary trend.
The Geneva-based WTO said disruption of US-China trade was expected to increase Chinese merchandise exports across all regions outside North America by between 4% and 9%.
Other countries would have opportunities to fill the gap in the United States in sectors such as textiles, clothing and electrical equipment.
Services trade, though not subject to tariffs, would also take a hit, the WTO said, by weakening demand related to goods trade such as transport and logistics. Broader uncertainty could dampen spending on travel and investment-related services.
The WTO said it expected commercial services trade to grow by 4.0% in 2025 and 4.1% in 2026, well below baseline projections of 5.1% and 4.8%.
The expected downturn follows a strong 2024, when the volume of world merchandise trade grew by 2.9% and commercial services trade expanded by 6.8%.