Kuwait fifth on competitiveness of Arab Economies

The report issued by the Arab Monetary Fund (AMF) titled ‘The Competitiveness of Arab Economies’ shows the competitive edge of the Arab countries which is an improvement in four countries, the UAE, Saudi Arabia, Qatar and Kuwait, between 2017 and 2020 — improvement in a number of sub-sectors — while six Arab countries maintained their competitive positions as was recorded in the previous issue of the report, reports Al-Rai daily.

The UAE topped the general index of the competitiveness of Arab economies followed by Saudi Arabia in second place, Qatar in third, Morocco fourth, Kuwait fifth and Oman sixth.

The report compared the Arab countries with 9 reference countries from several different regions — India, South Korea, Singapore, Thailand, Malaysia, Brazil, Turkey, Spain and South Africa — noting that according to that comparison, Singapore ranked first, South Korea in second place, the UAE third, Thailand fourth, Malaysia and Saudi Arabia fifth and sixth, respectively, Qatar ranked seventh, Spain eighth, Morocco ninth and Kuwait tenth, says the daily.

In the real GDP per capita index, Singapore, Qatar, the UAE, South Korea and Kuwait ranked among the top five.

Moreover, the Gulf Cooperation Council countries recorded the lowest levels in the average Arab unemployment rate, and the lowest was in Qatar with 3.5 percent, followed by Bahrain with 4.1 percent, then the UAE and Oman with 5 percent, followed by Kuwait with 6.8 percent, while Saudi Arabia recorded 8.2 percent during 2020.