Saudi Arabia is set to be the Middle East’s richest economy in terms of GDP per capita by 2050, according to a forecast by Citibank.
The report forecast that Saudis will have an average wealth of $98,311 by 2050. This is nearly four times the current rate of $24,200 gross domestic product (GDP) per capital, according to the CIA World Factbook.
The oil-rich kingdom tops the rankings for the Middle East and will be sixth overall on the global list by 2050, the rankings showed.
Singapore is set to top the worldwide rankings with $137,710, with Hong Kong ($116,639), Taiwan ($114,093), South Korea ($107,752) and the US ($100,802) rounding out the top five. With Saudi Arabia on sixth, Canada ($96,375), the UK ($91,130), Switzerland ($90,956) and Austria ($90,158) conclude the top ten.
The report found that world GDP will increase from $72 trillion in 2010 to $380 trillion by 2050 and will grow by 4.6 percent per annum until 2030 and by 3.8 percent between 2030 and 2050.
“Developing Asia and Africa will be the fastest growing regions, in our view, driven by population and income per capita growth, followed in terms of growth by the Middle East, Latin America, Central and eastern Europe, the CIS, and finally advanced nations of today,” the report said.
The Middle East is set to contribute four percent of global GDP by 2030 and by five percent by 2050.
In the short-term, Saudi Arabia, which holds around a fifth of the world’s proven petroleum reserves and derives 45 percent of its GDP from the petroleum sector, is set to see its economy grow by 3.9 percent in 2011, according to a new study by consultants Business Monitor International.
“Saudi Arabia’s non-oil sector will play an increasingly vital role for the economy, as the government’s initiative to diversify the economy away from the hydrocarbon sector will bolster private consumption and gross fixed capital formation [GFCF],” the report said.
As part of a longer-term spending plan, the government plans to spend US $155bn in 2011 alone, investing in education and infrastructure.
But BMI analysts said that until the mortgage law is passed, it believed that “persisting weak credit growth will pose risks to the country’s growth potential”.
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