Foreigners have pumped 71.2 billion Saudi riyals ($19 billion) into Saudi industrial projects, accounting for nearly 5 percent of the total industrial capital, according to official data.

At the end of the first quarter of 2023, foreign investors owned 920 factories of the total 10,800 industrial units in the Gulf Kingdom, figures by the Saudi Industry and Mineral Resources Ministry showed.

The report on Wednesday put the total industrial investment in the world’s largest oil exporter at around SAR1.4 trillion ($373.3 billion) at the end of the first quarter.

Saudi-owned industrial projects accounted for nearly 83.5 percent of the total while foreign investors controlled 8.5 percent and the rest are in joint ventures, the report said.

Small manufacturing units totalled 5,700 while there are 4,300 medium industrial projects and 824 large factories, it added.

(Writing by Nadim Kawach; Editing by Anoop Menon)

(anoop.menon@lseg.com)