Riyadh, Saudi Arabia — Saudi Arabia’s industrial sector saw more than SAR 542 billion ($144 billion) in foreign and joint investments so far this year, which translates into 37 percent of the sector’s total, and 17 percent of total existing factories, the kingdom’s Ministry of Industry and Mineral Resources said.
A spokesman of the ministry said in a statement that foreign investors had 930 factories in the kingdom, or 9 percent of the total with over SAR 71 billion investments. Joint investments reached 924, or 8 percent of the total with more than SAR 470 billion investments.
The number of factories totaled 10,910 with over SAR 1.46 trillion investments in the five-month period.
A report in Argaam said the foreign investments focused on the metallic mineral products (156 factories), rubber and plastics (106 factories), other nonmetallic mineral products (97 factories), chemicals (78 factories) and food products (73 factories).
It added that joint investments were concentrated in chemicals (161 factories), metallic mineral products (112 factories), rubber and plastics (83 factories), other nonmetallic mineral products (83 factories).
The small-sized industries accounted for the largest share of foreign and joint investments in the sector at 874 factories, medium-sized industries (754 factories) and large-sized industries (225 factories).