Originally published in The Aviator Middle East.
Aviation is one of the world’s greatest economic drivers, and Saudi Arabia is increasingly solidifying its role as a key player in fostering innovation, particularly across the areas of customer experience, safety, and environmental sustainability.
Pre-COVID-19, the aviation industry was contributing $3.5 trillion annually to the global economy, creating nearly 90 million jobs, and transporting more than 4.5 billion passengers each year. There’s a lot of optimism for growth as the industry continues to rebound from the pandemic. By 2035, the industry is estimated to contribute $5.7 trillion to the global economy and create an additional 10 million jobs.
Saudi Arabia is increasingly solidifying its role as a key player in fostering innovation, particularly across the areas of customer experience, safety, and environmental sustainability. Aviation already stands as a key pillar in the country’s Vision 2030, playing a pivotal role in enabling the kingdom’s broader economic and social ambitions through global connectivity.
Among the 12 Vision Realization Programs within Vision 2030, three are directly supported by the kingdom’s aviation sector, while the remaining nine partly benefit from its contributions.
Projected growth of the aviation industry
Aviation already stands as a key pillar in the country’s Vision 2030, playing a pivotal role in enabling the kingdom’s broader economic and social ambitions through global connectivity .
Pre-COVID-19, the aviation industry was contributing $3.5 trillion annually to the global economy, creating nearly 90 million jobs, and transporting more than 4.5 billion passengers each year. This rapid growth momentum is anticipated to continue over the coming years. By 2035, the industry is estimated to contribute $5.7 trillion to the global economy and create an additional 10 million jobs.
This anticipated growth will be propelled by advanced technologies and solutions, many of which will conceptualized ,
Among the 12 Vision Realization Programs within Vision 2030, three are directly supported by the kingdom’s aviation sector, while the remaining nine partly benefit from its contributions.
Saudi Arabia’s aviation ambitions
One of Saudi Arabia’s greatest competitive advantages in the aviation industry is the fact that it remains underserved, relative to its size and scale as a potential global player.
This positioning grants the kingdom strategic and tactical agility to capitalize on many — if not all — global aviation trends. Furthermore, Saudi Arabia is undergoing a ground-up transformation towards a digitally-first environment, promoting seamlessness, integration, and automation. The focus also emphasizes optimizing end-to-end passenger journeys and redefining the future of travel. Technologies such as data , AI, robotics, biometrics, and blockchain are integral to this transformation, driving tailored passenger experiences, and streamlining operations.
Saudi Arabia’s aviation goals include tripling annual passengers to 330 million, expanding connectivity to over 250 destinations from its 29 airports, and boosting air freight capacity to 4.5 million tons of cargo per annum by 2030 — a target outpacing global growth by anyone’s metrics. Rather than playing catch-up with established aviation powerhouses, Saudi Arabia aims to achieve these objectives by spearheading new initiatives, programs, and activities, to establish itself as a global center for innovation in the industry. By leveraging its advantageous geographical location, the kingdom seeks to position itself as a global passenger and logistics hub, connecting the world, driving innovation, and shaping the future of aviation.
Realizing such ambitious objectives requires building up the aviation ecosystem within the kingdom.This presents tremendous opportunities for partnership and participation, all of which have been forecasted by the Saudi government in the kingdom’s Aviation Strategy. The private sector’s participation remains a critical component of the Saudi strategy, playing a key role in sustaining aviation growth and positioning the kingdom among the top five countries globally for air transport efficiency by 2030.
The government also aims to have the aviation sector’s economic contribution hit $74.6 billion by 2030, up from the current b $21.3 billion. It is encouraging to see the country’s aviation industry being reshaped across all areas and showing impressive growth as well as more connectivity while acting as a pilot for new technologies and solutions. This trajectory promises direct and indirect contributions to various other sectors both within the kingdom and the wider region.
Read the full article here.