Saudi Arabia’s Hajj and Umrah Ministry showcase latest services at LEAP

RIYADH: The digitization of the economy is both a key to technological progress and a way to make everyday life easier and provide jobs and opportunities for young people.

This is especially true for Saudi Arabia as part of the Vision 2030 reform agenda, as considered in several sessions of this year’s LEAP conference.

According to the Saudi General Statistics Office, 36.7% of the Kingdom’s population is between the ages of 15 and 34. The accelerated growth of the digital economy in the Kingdom is expected to create over 1 million jobs by 2025. Focus on technology and innovation.

“The transformation happening behind Vision 2030 is probably one of the biggest opportunities in the world right now,” Careem CEO Mudasir Sheikh said during a panel on the theme of “Deep Dive: Unicorns of the World.” said.

“I have been here 15 years and for the last five years you can see change on the ground month after month. , we know there will be opportunities.”

Saudi Arabia’s unemployment rate fell to 9.7% in the second quarter of 2022, according to data provided by GASTAT. This was facilitated by government reforms directed at the labor market.

It is reflected in the Saudi labor market participation rate, which increased by 1.7 percentage points to reach 51.8 percent. The employment-to-population ratio of Saudis increased by the same amount, reaching 46.8% year-on-year, according to the GASTAT report.

Environmental and digital security is one of the fastest growing sectors in Saudi Arabia, according to data released on LinkedIn in January 2023.

Still, as Sheikha emphasized, there are still many issues to be resolved when it comes to services and related providers. “This opens new opportunities for the Saudi workforce,” he added. “We still have a lot of problems to solve. How do we solve those problems? We need to bring the right people to the market.”

There is no shortage of human capital and talent in the Saudi market, he added. “With hard work and the right tools, great things can happen. In my view, there is probably no better place than Saudi Arabia today,” he said.

The term “digital economy” reflects how the technological revolution is transforming value chains in exponential and innovative ways, giving markets around the world new opportunities to create social and economic change. I’m here.

“There is a global need for reskilling and upskilling. The OECD predicts that technology will dramatically change 1.1 billion jobs over the next decade,” said 2U, a leading US university software provider. Inc. co-founder and CEO Chip Paucek said.

“What’s happening with AI right now is a great example of this, and I’m very excited about what’s happening here in the Kingdom.”

Mahindra Satyam CEO Chander Prakash Gurnani, along with Mahindra Satyam CEO Chander Prakash Gurunani at a panel titled “Roadmap for Building a ‘Digital All’ Economy and Solving the Talent Conundrum in the Kingdom” on the main stage of LEAP. A conversation was held with British journalist Adam Boulton. It examines how Saudi Arabia is building an inclusive economy through rapid advances and investments in technology.

“India’s 1.4 billion population will benefit from the kingdom becoming a role model for technology,” said Gurnani. “The Kingdom is one of the countries that we are focusing on. , we need an ecosystem of both products and technology.”

Saudi Arabia is attracting more than $9 billion in investments in future technology, including US giants Microsoft and Oracle, which are building a cloud region in Saudi Arabia, said Saudi Minister of Communications and Information Technology Abdullah Al-Swah. told Reuters during LEAP on Monday.

Al-Swaha added that China’s Huawei will invest $400 million in cloud infrastructure for its services in Saudi Arabia and partner with Saudi Aramco to create another cloud region.

The Kingdom is also encouraging the use of AI to achieve the goals of Vision 2030 and Smart Government Strategy. With this plan, the kingdom’s AI market is estimated to grow to $135.2 billion by 2030, contributing 12.4% to the country’s gross domestic product.

As most of the panelists emphasized during the LEAP session, investment in technology is paramount to technological progress and economic growth, but it is also important to train a young and enthusiastic Saudi workforce and improve education and quaternary industries. It is to provide an opportunity for revolution. The kingdom is increasingly at the center of a new technological age.