Less than 15% of Saudi Arabian nationals work in the private sector, according to the state’s labour ministry.
Although expats play a huge role in the Middle East’s largest economy, they face a glass ceiling for the top executive posts.
Management roles at the highest level are reserved for Saudis, who hold an average 92% of the posts at managerial and clerical level.
The sector employing the most expats is engineering, with more than 3 million expat workers alongside 149,000 Saudis.
The jobs gap is not so pronounced in other sectors –
- 100,000 Saudis work in technology and science compared to 462,000 expats
- 265,000 Saudis are employed in the service sector, which has 2 million expat workers
- 106,000 Saudis are in sales, against 160,000 expats
- 23,000 Saudis have jobs in chemical and food industries, which employ 232,000 expats
Black economy
Just over 3,000 Saudis work in agriculture, animal husbandry and hunting, which employ almost 750,000 workers from overseas.
Another issue for the Saudi government is ‘cover up’ or tasattur businesses than operate in the black economy with an illegal expat workforce.
Cover up trade is estimated to account for a third of the Saudi economy or around £40 billion.
The Saudi government regards this black economy as such a problem a minister is tasked with overseeing closing down the sector.
The Council of Saudi Chambers (CSC) reckons 80% percent of car servicing and repair sector businesses are illegally run by foreigners working as cover-up businesses without the correct visas.
Cover up businesses
A spokesman explained that cover-up businesses and the massive financial profits generated from the motor trade have attracted huge numbers of illegal expat workers.
The government has granted a period of grace for firms to legalise their operations that expires on November 4. After that, the government will only let Saudis run the motor trade.
The retail sector is another market the government is tackling to rid the sector of cover up businesses.
“About a third of all expats in Saudi Arabia work in a cover up business,” said a government spokesman.
“Expats run around 98% of the nation’s retail and wholesale markets and the labour ministry wants to take these businesses back and hand them to Saudis to create around 600,000 jobs.”
Expats can still run their businesses, but must join with a Saudi partner and have a work force with the right visas and permits.
