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While Kuwait's project awards fell short of expectations during the first quarter of 2022, they are expected to gradually recover in the coming months to touch up to 3 billion Kuwaiti dinars ($9.8 billion), the Vice-Chairman and CEO of National Bank of Kuwait (NBK) Group said.
Isam Al-Sager said in a press statement that the 110 million dinars ($360 million) of project awards recorded in the first quarter of 2022 fell short of expectations due to the slow approval process as well as supply chain issues.
He said: "We expect more projects to be awarded in various sectors including education, healthcare, communication, petrochemicals, as well as other sectors. We should see a pickup in tendering and awarding activity in 2022 with an estimate of around 2 to 3 billion dinars of projects to be awarded for the rest of the year."
Al-Sager noted that that there was a slowdown in project awards in the past due to conflict between the government and parliament. However, in 2021, the improved health situation and the easing of restrictions from the pandemic more than made up for the government's resignation and resulting political friction to lift corporate activity and take project awards to 1.5 billion dinars ($4.9 billion).
NBK reported profits of 116.6 million dinars ($381 million) for the first quarter of 2022, a growth of 38.3 percent year on year.
(1 US Dollar = 0.31 Kuwaiti Dinars)
(Writing by SA Kader; Editing by Anoop Menon)
