Saudi Arabia sets up National Infrastructure Fund

Saudi Arabia has launched a new national infrastructure fund in partnership with BlackRock, the world’s largest asset manager. 

Together, both parties will support projects valued at over 200 billion riyals (US$53.4bn) in various sectors considered by the kingdom to be “vital” over the next four years.

According to a report published by the Saudi Press Agency, the fund will provide financing to projects in sectors such as transport, water, energy, health, education, telecoms, and digital infrastructure.

Experts and analysts expect this big singular move to cause a significant increase in the kingdom’s national gross domestic product and also to create more jobs.

“The fund also aims to contribute to the development of the financial sector by finding alternative solutions to finance infrastructure projects and encouraging the private sector to invest in these projects,” the news agency said.

This latest infrastructure fund has been set up under the kingdom’s National Development Fund (NDF), which was established in 2017 to manage economic development funds across different ministries in the kingdom.