Saudi Arabia’s Jazan Economic City (JEC), part of ambitious government development plans, said on Tuesday it has attracted 100 billion riyals ($26 billion) of investment from Saudi, Chinese and Malaysian firms.“JEC has achieved $26 billion worth of investments within a time span of two years, well ahead of the 25-year target envisaged during the project launch in 2006,” said Feizal Ali, CEO of Malaysia’s MMC Corp., in a statement.
MMC and Saudi Binladin Group are the city’s developers, forming the JEC company.
The government has tried to reassure Saudis over the past two weeks that modernisation schemes are on track after fears of a global economic slowdown helped push oil prices down to under $70 a barrel from double that a few months ago.
The state news agency mentioned a figure earlier this week of 25 billion riyals ($6.7 billion) of investment.
The statement listed firms from China, Malaysia, Bahrain and Saudi Arabia who will develop a new deep water port, ship-building project and steel, aluminium and car component manufacturing, as well as support facilities.
Jazan is one of four economic cities the government is establishing in an effort to diversify the economy away from its reliance on oil, to attract foreign investment and provide its burgeoning youth population with jobs.
In 2006, the last year for which there were available figures, Ali said the developer would need to raise around $13 billion to fund the $30 billion project.
Last year the company planned to offer 30 percent to the public in a 2008 initial public offering.
The bourse has fallen about 50 percent this year due to the global financial crisis. (Reuters)
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