Governor of the Saudi Contractors Authority (SCA) Thabet Al-Sawyeed said that the annual volume of contracting sector projects in the Kingdom has reached 250 billion riyals (USD 66 billion).
He noted that the virtual Future Projects Forum (FPF), which will be held this week, would enable local enterprises to build alliances with international companies to implement major ventures presented within the 1,000 projects with a total value of 1.6 billion riyals (USD 426 million).
In an interview with Asharq Al-Awsat, Al-Sawyeed said that the FPF would be launched on Monday, with the participation of project owners, contractors and stakeholders from 35 countries. Among the proposed initiatives is the Authority’s Innovation Center, which is entrusted with studying the latest technologies in the contracting sector.
“We also intend to launch an initiative next month to provide specialized consultations to contractors, interested persons and workers in the sector,” he said, noting that the initiative aims to offer information, recommendations and guidance to contribute to raising the quality of outputs.
Al-Sawyeed emphasized that the Authority was working to empower small, medium and micro enterprises, as they represent 99 percent of the sector. He noted that one of the main focus was to facilitate access to integrated information that reflects the extent of growth and distribution of contractors with their classifications in different regions and cities.
“The contracting sector in the largest in the Kingdom in terms of the number of establishments that exceed 170,000 companies. Small and micro-enterprises constitute 96.5 percent, medium-sized account for 3 percent and large companies represent around 1 percent of the sector,” he said.
The size of the market projects reaches 250 billion riyals annually, in which government projects represent the largest percentage, while the number of employees exceeds 3 million.
“The contracting sector is very large and connects 28 different segments, including engineering, project management and financing agencies. Therefore, the Saudi Contractors Authority was established to organize and enable this sector to reflect positively on the state’s economy,” Al-Sawyeed told Asharq Al-Awsat.
He explained that the role of the Authority was based on three main sections, the first of which is the regulatory procedures related to labor, equipment, contracts, and the contractual relationship between the contractor and other parties.
“The second part of the Authority’s role is to empower establishments through a special platform that provides statistics and access to integrated information about the extent of growth and the distribution of contractors with their classifications in different regions and cities, as well as employment and project opportunities,” he remarked.
As for the third, it is represented in value-added services, Al-Sawyeed noted.
“We intend to launch an initiative within the next month to provide specialized consultations to contractors, interested persons and workers in the sector,” he said.
“My message to the sector stems from the Authority’s vision in building the future. We know that there are challenges facing the establishments, but my vision is full of optimism,” he underlined.
Al-Sawyeed continued: “During the past five years, the local market has witnessed many developments within the Kingdom’s Vision 2030. There are great opportunities ahead and we must take advantage of the mega projects that will be implemented in the next phase and focus on business development to raise the level of efficiency and productivity to increase the sector’s competitiveness with international companies.”
