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Problems and Prospects of Development in the Arabian Peninsula1

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  29 January 2009

Yusif A. Sayigh
Yusif A. Sayigh
Affiliation:
American University of Beirut
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Extract

The Arabian Peninsula has an area of about 1·2 million square miles but only some 11·5 million inhabitants—roughly 10 persons to the square mile.2 In absolute terms, this makes the Peninsula one of the least-populated regions in the world. However, as we will have occasion to indicate further on, the population is not sparse if account is taken of the scarcity of water, the niggardliness of nature except for oil, the low level of economic performance, and the narrow base of development.

Type
Articles
Information
International Journal of Middle East Studies , Volume 2 , Issue 1 , January 1971 , pp. 40 - 58
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1971

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References

page 40 note 2 Estimates of area in different sources do not diverge widely. However, population figures, particularly for Saudi Arabia and Yemen, the two most populous countries, vary within a very wide range. The former's population, for instance, was at one time, early in the sixties, estimated by an authoritative but private agency at 3.25 million but by the Saudi authorities at 6 million. Asfour's study for the Economic Research Institute at the American University of Beirut (see later) independently estimated the population at 3.2 million, using an approach different from the ones used in the other estimates. Yemen's population, according to the 3rd edition of the R.I.I.A.'s The Middle East, is ‘certainly 4 and perhaps as much as 8 million strong’ (p. 73). But, in the words of a recent publication, ‘according to reliable estimates the total population numbers approximately 3,500,000 to 4,000,000’ (Manfred, W. Wenner, Modern Yemen 1918–1966, p. 29).Google Scholar The population and area figures for the whole Arabian Peninsula quoted in the text, and as in Table I, are collated from different sources. Cross-checks were made in the following references: (a) Fenelon, K. G., The Trucial States: A Brief Economic Survey (Khayat, Beirut, 1967), table IX, p. 83;Google Scholar (b) Arabian American Oil Company, Aramco Handbook: Oil and the Middle East (Dhahran, Saudi Arabia, 1968), p. 175;Google Scholar (c) General Union of Chambers of Commerce, Industry, and Agriculture for Arab Countries, Economic Development in Arab Countries 1950–1965 (Beirut, 1967), pp. 71, 72Google Scholar (in Arabic); (d) Royal Institute of International Affairs, The Middle East, A Political and Economic Survey, 3rd ed. (Oxford University Press, 1958), pp. 73, 94, 102, 106, 113, 122, 131, 138, 141, 142;Google Scholar and (e) Manfred, W. Wenner, Modern Yemen 1918–1966 (Baltimore, Johns Hopkins University Press, 1967), p. 29.Google Scholar

page 43 note 1 For the educational pattern in Kuwait, see Kuwait Planning Board, Statistical Yearbook 1968,Google Scholar §3, ‘Education’. The highlights of educational activity in the whole Peninsula can be seen in Table 2. In Saudi Arabia, ‘approximately 10 per cent of the Saudi labor force had [in 1962] completed primary education’. See United Nations, United Nations Economic and Social Office in Beirut, Studies on Selected Development Problems in Various Countries in the Middle East, 1968 (New York, 1968), p. 25.Google Scholar

page 43 note 2 See Aramco Handbook, p. 184, for a reference to this point.Google Scholar

page 46 note 1 Kuwait, Planning Board, Statistical Yearbook 1968, data collated from tables 2, 3, 5–7 in §4, ‘Health Statistics’.Google Scholar

page 47 note 1 Fenelon, , op. cit. p. 25.Google Scholar

page 47 note 2 Food and Agriculture Organization, Production Yearbook 1967, vol. 21 (Rome, 1968), pp. 5, 6,Google Scholar for data on land relating to Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, Yemen, and People's Republic of Southern Yemen. For data relating to the other parts of the Peninsula, see Fenelon, , table IX, p. 83.Google Scholar

page 48 note 1 For details of the composition of international trade, see Food and Agriculture Organization, Trade Yearbook 1967, vol. 21 (Rome, 1968). See also the statistical yearbooks and trade statistics of Kuwait and Saudi Arabia; the General Union of Chambers of Commerce, Industry, and Agriculture, op. cit., as well as the half-yearly issues of the Arab Economic Report published by the General Union beginning with 12 1962.Google Scholar

page 49 note 1 Food and Agriculture Organization, Indicative World Plan for Agricultural Development 1965–1985: Near East, Subregional Study no. I, vol. I, text (provisional) (Rome, 1966), table 3, p. 35, table 4, p. 36, table 5, p. 37, and tables 6 and 7, p. 40.Google Scholar

page 49 note 2 Industry in Kuwait represented 3·6 per cent of Gross Domestic Product for 1966/67, while agriculture and fishing represented 0·5 per cent, building and construction 4·7 per cent, trade 8 per cent, government 5·8 per cent, gas, electricity and water 2·3 per cent, transport, communication, and storage 2·8 per cent, other services 11·3 per cent (including rents and real estate, finance, entertainment, health and education in the private sector, hotels and restaurants, and personal services), and oil 61·1 per cent. See Planning Board, First 5-Year Plan of Economic and Social Development 1967/68–1971/72 (Kuwait, undated), p. 35Google Scholar (in Arabic). In Saudi Arabia, revenue from oil (including local expenditure by Aramco) was estimated to represent 41 per cent of Gross National Product. No estimates for the other sectors exist. See Edmond, Y. Asfour, Saudi Arabia: Long-Term Projections of Supply of and Demand for Agricultural Products (Economic Research Institute, American University of Beirut, 1965), p. 46.Google Scholar

page 49 note 3 Kuwait, Planning Board, Statistical Abstract 1968, tables 3 and 4 of §II, ‘Foreign Trade’.Google Scholar

page 50 note 1 Economic Development in Arab Countries 1950–1965, p. 115.Google Scholar

page 51 note 1 Kuwait, , Statistical Abstract 1968, table 5 in §2, ‘Population and Vital Statistics’.Google Scholar

page 51 note 2 Kuwait, , Planning Board, First 5-Year Plan of Economic and Social Development, calculated from table 9, p. 44.Google Scholar

page 53 note 1 The information included is collated from the following sources: (a) Publications of the General Union of Arab Chambers of Commerce, Industry, and Agriculture in the Arab Countries cited above; (b) U.N., U.N.E.S.O.B., Studies on Selected Development Problems in Various Countries in the Middle East (New York, 1967);Google Scholar (c) U.N., U.N.E.S.O.B., Studies on Selected Development Problems in Various Countries in the Middle East, 1968 (New York, 1968);Google Scholar (d) United Nations, Industrial Development in the Arab Countries (New York, 1967);Google Scholar (e) United Nations, Report of the Symposium on Industrial Development in Arab Countries (New York, 1967);Google Scholar (f) International Bank for Reconstruction and Development, The Economic Development of Kuwait (Baltimore, The Johns Hopkins University Press, 1965);Google Scholar (g) Kuwait, Planning Board, First 5-Year Plan..., cited above; (h) Aramco Handbook.., cited above; (i) Ahmad Fuad khalife, Agricultural Extension in the Arab Countries: A Comparative StudyGoogle Scholar (Center for Cornmunity development in the Arab World, Sirs-il-Layyan, U.A.R., 1967) (in Arabic); and (j) Food and Agriculture Organization, Land Policy in the Near East (Rome, 1967), published for the Government of Libya by FAO and compiled by Mohammed Riad El-Ghonemy of FAO.Google Scholar

page 54 note 1 U.N., U.N.E.S.O.B., Studies on Development Problems in Various Countries in the Middle East, 1968, p. 25.Google Scholar

page 55 note 1 The past development and the prospects of the oil industry are left out of this account, although the oil sector is by far the most significant factor in the economic life of the Peninsula. The exclusion is due to the fact that this sector ought to receive separate treatment. Suffice it to indicate here that the oil-producing parts of the Peninsula produced some 312 million tons of crude oil in 1967 and earned some $1,812 million in direct revenue to governments. The implications of so large a revenue need no emphasis.