"Bahrain is transforming its economy by moving beyond oil and fast- tracking new industries centered on innovation and sustainability. How is the country attracting investment, developing local talent, and tackling infrastructure and regulatory challenges to secure long-term growth? Hear insights on how the country is positioning itself as a regional hub for business and a model for 	economic resilience. "

MPW Spotlight: Bahrain's Path To Economic Transformation

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A big thank you to our panel of brilliant founders. We're now going to move on to talk about Bahrain, another country that is transforming its economy beyond oil and focusing on new areas of business that are both innovative and sustainable. And here to tell us how the country is doing this. And particularly how it is positioning itself for long term economic resiliency. Please welcome Her Excellency Nour Bint Al Kuli, the Minister of Sustainable Development for Bahrain, and also the chief executive of the Bahrain Economic Development Board, and she'll be in conversation with my colleague Mihal Levbraham. Thank you so much for joining us. Um, I wanna start by asking you just kind of a, a basic question. Um, so 86% of Bahrain's GDP is now made up of non-oil sectors, which is probably a surprise to some people from, uh, outside of the Gulf region. Um, what have been the, the pillars of this kind of new transformed economy thus far, at least? Of course, if you allow me first, I, I want to, um, say that it's a pleasure to be here. It's a pleasure to, to spend time with powerful women. Um, I'm very grateful to our, our, our friends and family in Saudi for, for the invite and also for a fortune for hosting or choosing uh Saudi specifically in the Middle East to host this international event. Um, grateful also for the opportunity to. light more on on Bahrain, um, so we are Saudi's neighbors. If people are not aware, small island, uh, close to the eastern province. We do have a bloodline between us and Saudi, so we have a causeway that's been there almost celebrating 40 years, uh, next year I believe. Um, so for us our economy and the Saudi economy has been interconnected for for many, many, many years, and, and we see ourselves as an integral part of the GCC economy. Um, but you're absolutely right. When you look at the split, people think, um, a GCC oil rich countries, oil must be the biggest contributor to their economy. But actually, in fact, for us, oil is not even the biggest sector in our economy and hasn't been for the past almost two years now. Um, and that's the result of a journey that stretches over, over decades, um, but if we look at just the past 20 years, um, we've had a transformation in the way we were looking at our economy and what we want to achieve, uh, and that was really, um, solidified after launching Vision 2030 for Bahrain back in 2008, and the vision said that our economy going forward would be driven by the private sector and that we have to remain competitive and in order to remain competitive. Um, and allow the private sector to lead in that transformation. The government has to make sure that our procedures are seamless, or straightforward, are easy to understand, our legislation are supportive of private sector building in Bahrain. We have to make sure that we have the right to human capital in Bahrain to drive that, um, and we have to make sure actually it's specifically said there that we have to make sure that we do that without um impacting the environment and while making sure that we maintain our culture. Um, so today, uh, we have financial services sector being the largest sector of our economy, contributing about 17%, and that's really building on the history of Bahrain being a financial hub, um, in the region. And even within that sector there's been a lot of transformation in recent years. We hear a lot about technology for us the biggest growth areas at the moment are through FinTech. Um, the second largest actually is manufacturing. That's again a decision that was taken more than 40, 50 years ago of um investing in in an aluminum smeltzer, and that led to a downstream, um, manufacturing industry. And now that's being diversified thanks again to, to tech and, and the openness of the country. So yeah, there's a lot of transformation, um, driven by those factors and so one of your key areas of focus is growing outside investment and local investment well, um, to. Private sector obviously um how how do you, what's the strategy there and, and what areas are I mean you just touched on some of the bigger sectors what areas are most attractive from an outside investor's perspective. So as a country we focus on, we make sure that we always articulate our key sectors. So we have 5 key sectors financial services, manufacturing for us logistics is very important. Tourism is a huge, um, a huge sector for us with a huge potential and also ICT or technology and, and, and, uh, digitization. So each of those sectors has a sector strategy with clear KPIs and this is where we want, where we want to reach. And so we, we use that and, and under each what I said earlier is we look at what human capital do we need. So what, what training courses do we need? How many people do we need, what jobs are being created, and then we. A lot of efforts into to make sure that we have the right human capital that to fill in those jobs. We look at legislation all the time. We keep reviewing legislation. We keep looking at how can we further improve what we're doing. So just one example that we did, and I know Saudi's looking into that, and that's very, very exciting. Uh, is, is introducing a data, uh, embassy law, so basically for data centers which for us in this day and age, it's an essential infrastructure, uh, um, um, that you need for, for projects to succeed. So Bahrain a few years ago introduced a data legislation law. So what, what it allows allows countries to host data in Bahrain and treats that data as an embassy. So no court order in Bahrain can access that data and that gets a lot of comfort for for companies. So, uh, legislation for us. Important infrastructure is important. Um, the, the, the population is small, right, about 1.5, 1.5 million. It's also a very young population as it is here in Saudi. In what ways does the small size of the population actually help in, you know, bringing about a fast transformation? We see the size as an advantage for us. We actually say our small size is an advantage for us because we can do things collectively. And there is a whole of government, whole of society approach when we do introduce something. It also means that you can use Bahrain and the way we see it is Bahrain is the testing ground for countries in the region and the wider in a region because you could come and test your idea in a smaller scale and if it goes wrong, so what it's 1.5 million people, it didn't really go wrong. But if it succeeds, go up and and scale it up and use Bahrain as, as your, your really testing grounds. So there's a lot of programs for financial services and for technology to come and, and, and, and take advantage. Also means that we can easily identify where the gaps are and it means that we work very closely with the private sector. We call ourselves the Team Bahrain. We don't really talk as government, private sector, and society. There's a Team Bahrain. Um, a really ethos in the country and we do this collectively for us as economic development board, we have a board that's half made up of government but also the other half is made up of, of family businesses and, and private sector representatives, and that collaboration is really how we, we operate in the. Um, the whole, the, the economies of the whole Gulf region obviously are, are growing. International Monetary Fund projects the growth of the region's economies at an average rate of 3.5% this year, 4.2% next year. That's higher than the projected growth rate of. You know, average advanced economies, um, can you talk a little bit more about how Bahrain differentiates itself from your neighbors? You touched on some of these, you know, unique attributes, but what else would you say about it? Is it a differentiator? Sure, um, what I wanna say is this we were talking about this backstage, but it's really an exciting time for, for the GCC, um, for the main region for us who. Been here who've lived here has always seen the potential in the region. It's really nice for the rest of the world to recognize where this region is is heading, and I know there are huge numbers talking about conservative numbersize of the economy today is about 2 trillion in the GCC, projected to be about 3 trillion in 2030, doubling by 2050. That is a huge. momentum that is happening thanks to stability, thanks to having visions, thanks to having strategies and really everyone coming together and making sure that we have the right infrastructure for it. For us, we see Bahrain as the gateway to the GCC. We see it again as as an economy that's complementary to what's happening in the region. We always look to see what Saudi's doing. For us we could be the service center. We see ourselves as the service center to Saudi. If Saudi's developing a huge market in in, say, um, is developing manufacturing, what Bahrain is looking to do is how can I complement what is happening in Saudi in terms of providing the human capital and also being a place where support functions could also set up to support what. Happening in Saudi similar to UAE where UAE is a is a big financial hub at the moment. Bahrain could be the tech hub, could be the back office, the, the, the center of excellence, uh, the support functions for, for those, as well as attracting, of course, the, the, the beginnings of the big companies. OK, well, I think, uh, you made an incredible pitch for your country. I will say I, uh, I, I, I'll I'll know. An invitation. I'll help you out. I also, I've had incredible saudi food here and I also was lucky enough to eat at a Bahraini restaurant last night, so I'm appreciating all of the cuisine from the region. other people when they come to visit the region, you have to try the food. It's, it's, it's a big plus for the region. So please enjoy your time if you're visiting. Thank you so much, Eric. Thank you. Thank you.