Official data showed today, Tuesday, that Saudi’s gross domestic product GDP grew 9.9 percent in the first quarter, more than a preliminary estimate of 9.6 percent last month.
And the chief economist at Abu Dhabi Commercial Bank, Monica Malik, announced that this is the fastest growth since the third quarter of 2011, mainly due to the increase in oil production, reported “Reuters.”
The General Authority for Statistics said, “This economic growth is mainly due to the significant increase achieved by oil activities, which amounted to 20.3 percent.”
GDP growth was 2.6 percent higher than the fourth quarter, while oil activity rose 2.9 percent on a quarterly basis.
The Statistics Authority stated that petroleum and natural gas activities were the largest contributors to the GDP, with a rate of 32.4 percent.
Non-oil activity rose 3.7 percent, or 0.9 percent, from the previous quarter. Government activity also rose 2.4 percent on an annual basis but declined 0.9 percent from the fourth quarter.
“All economic activities witnessed positive growth rates on an annual basis in the first quarter of 2022,” the Statistics Authority said.
The data showed that the activities of wholesale and retail trade, restaurants, and hotels grew 6.3 percent compared to the previous year, while exports grew 22.1 percent.
“The fundamental data continues to point to a healthy pace of expansion in the non-oil sector,” Malik said.
