Saudi top construction market in Mena
Dubai, November 4, 2012
Saudi Arabia remains the leading construction market in the Middle East and Northern Africa (Mena) region with a potential pipeline of $200 billion projects to be awarded over the period 3Q2012-2013, a report said.
The Bank of America Merrill Lynch report, which monitored Meed contract awards data, highlights a potential pipeline of $374 billion projects to be awarded during the period 3Q12-2013 in the UAE, Qatar, Egypt and Saudi Arabia, of which 53.7 per cent is to take place in Saudi Arabia.
The total pipeline of construction and infrastructure project awards for the four countries stands at $157 billion and $110 billion (41.9 per cent and 29.5 per cent of the total, respectively), said the report.
In particular, in Saudi Arabia, the pipeline of construction and infrastructure project awards stands at $90 billion and $39 billion (45 per cent and 19 per cent of total). With the LNG expansion completed,
Qatar’s pipeline is now skewed to construction and infrastructure (96.4 per cent of total), the report said.
Solid growth in construction awards in main GCC countries
Total year-to-September broad Mena contracts awarded are moderately down year-on-year, though closing up the gap versus 2Q12 (where they were down by 40 per cent yoy). While Kuwait and Iraq construction in particular drag down the total, year-to-date contract awards in the UAE, Qatar
and Saudi increased by 25 per cent yoy to $41 billion, said the report.
Construction and infrastructure awards in the latter countries also increased by 16 per cent yoy to $18 billion year-todate, the report said.
The report said Egypt continues to suffer from the aftermath of the Revolution with investments at their lowest levels in two decades.
Over the past year, Egypt saw the largest number of projects cancelled and/or put on hold
(seemingly evenly spread across the construction, infrastructure hydrocarbon, petrochemical sectors) while Qatar witnessed the largest increase in projects entering tender mode. The UAE appears to have turned a corner when it comes to severe project rationalisation or cancellations after $450 billion of these were put on hold between March 2010 and October 2011 (construction accounted for 89 per cent of total project cancellations in the UAE to date), the report said. - TradeArabia News Service
