Riyadh, Saudi Arabia –As the biggest economy in the GCC, Saudi Arabia is quickly becoming the top pick for future leaders in technology and innovation.
In 2016, the kingdom launched Vision 2030, a strategy to diversify its economy away from oil. As a result, entrepreneurship and small businesses are expected to significantly contribute to the country’s non-oil GDP.
The Saudi government has supported private institutions targeting startups to further boost investment in non-oil sectors
The kingdom’s Small and Medium Enterprises (SME) General Authority, Monshaat, designs initiatives that promote a culture of entrepreneurship and sets policies and standards in the sector.
Monshaat also organizes the kingdom’s global startup and SME forum, Biban, which fosters tangible opportunities by uniting local and international entrepreneurs, investors, and government officials to collaborate and share insights.
Saudi is the top choice
On Twitter, TRENDS conducted a poll asking its followers about their preferred country for starting a business or becoming an entrepreneur, and Saudi Arabia emerged as the top choice, with 35 percent of the respondents selecting it.
The United Arab Emirates came in second with 29 percent of the votes, while only 14 percent of the voters chose the United States, and 22 percent voted for other countries.
Voters were mainly from Egypt (87.5 percent), Qatar (5.2 percent), followed by Lebanon (4.9 percent), Kuwait (1.4 percent), Saudi Arabia (0.6 percent), and only 0.3 percent of the voters were from other countries.
Males were the majority of the voters at 74.1 percent. Most of them were from the age group of 20 to 29 years (43.6 percent), followed by the age-group of 30 to 39 years (37.9 percent), and the 40-49 years (12.3 percent), while only 6.2 percent of the voters were above 50.
Fourth globally
Saudi Arabia has achieved an advanced position in the list of the best countries for entrepreneurship, as it ranked fourth after the UAE, the Netherlands, and Finland.
According to a report published by the Global Entrepreneurship Monitor (GEM), the kingdom has risen to fourth place globally in terms of the ease with which new businesses can be established and maintained, surpassing the economies of South Korea, Switzerland, the United States, and the United Kingdom—the most encouraging of business ownership.
Saudi Arabia also ranked first among the 45 countries in terms of the indicators of the response of the kingdom’s government and the entrepreneurs to the pandemic.
SMEs’ growth
Saudi Arabia, according to the GEM report, has also witnessed remarkable progress in this sector during the last three years, while the number of entrepreneurial establishments has reached 626,000 in 2022.
The contribution of these projects is expected to reach 35 percent of the GDP by 2030.
Micro-enterprises have hired about 2.163 million workers and small companies about 1.82 million workers, representing 49 percent of the total employees in Saudi companies, according to the Statistics Authority.
The percentage of female entrepreneurs was about 17.7 percent during the years 2021 and 2022.