Al-Naimi presents 8 Saudi Mining Exhibition and Symposium awards
RIYADH — Saudi Arabia’s Minister of Petroleum & Mineral Resources Ali Al-Naimi presented partnership awards to eight local and international business leaders at the end of the opening session of the Saudi Mining & Minerals Exhibition & Symposium in Riyadh.
The recipients are Saudi Arabian Mining Company (Ma’aden) president and chief executive officer Khalid Al-Mudaifer; Saudi Geological Survey (SGS) president Zohair A Nawab; National Industrial Cluster Development Program president Khalild Al-Salem; Atheeb Intergraph Saudi Company (AISC) vice president Fahad Al-Saneea; Outotec vice president Pentti Korjonen; Saudi Specialty Chemical Industries Company Limited (SSCI) chief executive officer Jamal Matalka; The Saudi British Bank head of Saudi global corporates Mazen AlBanuyan, and ThyssenKrupp Saudi Arabian Contracting chief executive officer Thomas Dreiling.
The inaugural event for Saudi Arabia’s mining industry is designed to engage all stakeholders in the sector from upstream exploration to downstream industrial development. More than 3,000 delegates and visitors are expected. The exhibition features 50 exhibitors from 10 countries.
Meanwhile, a senior World Bank official last year said the oil-rich Gulf states spend more than $160 billion on energy subsidies annually. Saudi Arabia accounted for about half that figure.
A 2013 report from the University of California, Berkeley, said the kingdom had the world's largest fuel subsidies, at about $25 billion in 2012.
Oil makes up roughly 90 percent of Saudi government revenue but global prices have dropped by more than half from early last year to less than $50 a barrel, reducing revenue.
The International Monetary Fund projected a budget shortfall of 19.5 percent of gross domestic product, or around $130 billion, this year but said the Saudi deficit would fall in 2016.
It said that the kingdom had informed the IMF that it was considering energy price reforms for commercial and industrial users.
Adjusting Saudi gasoline and diesel prices – currently among the lowest on Earth – to that of Gulf levels would save $17 billion this year.
The United Arab Emirates, another oil producer facing a budget deficit, in July ended subsidies on fuel, in a move expected to save it billions of dollars annually. — SG
