Saudi Arabia’s powerful Council of Economic and Development Affairs (CEDA) has cancelled projects valued at up to 1 trillion Saudi riyals ($266.7 billion), the SPA and other news outlets report.
“The CEDA has also stopped awarding a big number of projects whose spending does not go in line with the expected economic and development return … which could have reached 1 trillion Saudi riyals if contracted,” it said, according to Reuters.
The government has also discussed settling payments to the private sector before the end of the fiscal year.
Deputy Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman is the chairman of CEDA, and announced the changes as a series of measures that would boost the Kingdom’s economy in the wake of the international decline of oil prices, according to the London-based pro-government newspaper, Asharq Alawsat.
“The measures taken by Saudi Arabia in 2015—tapping into foreign reserves, cutting spending, delaying projects, and selling bonds—seem to be reoccurring after another year of painful prices for the kingdom. And while Saudi Arabia has so far managed to tread financial water throughout the 2015 and 2016 oil price slump, many analysts feel that 2017 brings dimmer prospects to the state’s finances, despite all the efforts by OPEC members to stabilize the oil markets,” Julianne Geiger writes for Oilprice.com.
