gulfnews : On the road to economic integration in the Gulf

With the Eurozone running up against new challenges and protectionist tendencies on the rise worldwide, the merits of economic integration, in which several national economies agree to coalesce into a larger single entity, have recently been called into question.

But this context unfairly overshadows the substantial economic and strategic benefits that integration has brought about in many parts of the world — including the EU.

Integration in the EU has seen the creation of 2.75 million new jobs and 2.2 per cent of additional GDP as a direct result of integration efforts that facilitated the movement of goods, services and labour between countries.