Friday 23 October 2009

Emirate re-engineered

When Saeed Alromaithi’s friends phoned him at his new place of work, they would often have a chuckle. They could hear the clank of heavy machinery in the background or the roar of a steel plant’s furnaces. “They used to make fun of me when they called and heard all this noise,” says Mr Alromaithi, his blue work jacket and jeans a contrast to the pristine white robe that is the uniform of most of his fellow Emiratis.

Their reaction is not surprising. Since the 1970s, when a spike in oil prices brought wealth to the Gulf, its nationals have gained the reputation for avoiding work that might risk an encounter with sweat or dirt, preferring instead the air-conditioned office suites of, say, a state oil company or sovereign wealth fund. Governments provided social safety nets that hoovered up graduates and dealt out public sector jobs for life.

That is a phenomenon some of the region’s leaders now seem to have grasped is unsustainable as populations swell and they look to a future when oil runs out. The need to diversify economies and develop private sectors has become a common theme.

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