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China and Saudi Arabia have signed 35 investment agreements worth about $30 billion, during Chinese President Xi Jinping’s visit to the Kingdom, according to local media reports and press statements.
The deals include several sectors such as green energy, technology and cloud services, transportation, logistics, medical industries, construction, and manufacturing.
The agreements include the first alignment plan between the Kingdom’s Vision 2030 and China’s Belt and Road Initiative.
Zawya Projects has summarised key investment agreements as below:
Saudi Aramco signed a Memorandum of Understanding with Shandong Energy Group to explore collaboration on integrated refining and petrochemical opportunities in China. The scope extends to cooperation across technologies related to hydrogen, renewables and carbon capture and storage.
ACWA Power, the Saudi based global developer and operator of water and power projects, signed a series of agreements with 9 Chinese entities to finance, invest and construct ACWA Power’s global clean and renewable energy projects in Saudi Arabia and Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) countries.
A joint venture (JV) of Saudi’s Rafal Real Estate Development and China’s CITIC Construction, subsidiary of CITIC group will build 20,000 residential apartments in the North-East of Riyadh under a 12 billion Saudi riyal ($3.5 billion) contract with the National Housing Company.
The JV will also establish an industrial complex for prefabricated construction in Riyadh. The facility will supply integrated solutions ranging from green pre-cast and modular housing to electro-mechanical installations and finishings to fast-track the construction and delivery of social housing projects in the Kingdom. Construction works for the planned facility are expected to begin in the third quarter of 2023, and operations are targeted to start in January 2024.
Saudi’s Al Jomaih Energy & Water Company and China General Nuclear Power Corporation (CGN) have signed an MoU to jointly develop up to 10 gigawatts of solar, wind, gas and thermal energy projects in Saudi Arabia, Bangladesh, Laos, Azerbaijan and other countries in Asia.
The Saudi Ministry of Communications and Information Technology (MCIT) and Huawei signed a MoU to enhance cooperation in the field of communications and information technology. The Ministry and Huawei will collaborate to:
- Develop '10Gbps Society', with superfast broadband infrastructure to support the digital transformation goals of Saudi Vision 2030. An initial 10GB district pilot will be launched in 2023.
- Build a nationwide Unified Government Network Infrastructure standard to serve all government entities
- Support Huawei’s plans to build a cloud computing region in the Kingdom and develop partnerships with local data centre service providers.
- To support digital entrepreneurs working on smart cities, IoT, AI, gaming, fintech, e-commerce, and blockchain projects
Saudi Ministry of Investment (MISA) and Shandong Innovation Metal Group signed a pact to build an aluminium plant.
(Writing by D Madhura; Editing by Anoop Menon)