Gulf countries are seeking to achieve economic unity by 2025

Arab Gulf states yesterday discussed the developments of the programme to achieve economic unity amongst them by 2025.

This was during a meeting of the GCC Financial and Economic Cooperation Committee in the Saudi capital, Riyadh, with the participation of the finance ministers of the six member states, and the Secretary-General of the GCC, Nayef Al-Hajraf.

According to the Saudi Press Agency (SPA), the committee reviewed the recommendations submitted to it regarding the developments of the programme to achieve economic unity among GCC states by 2025.

The committee also reviewed the remaining steps for the establishment of the GCC Customs Union Authority and the full implementation of the Gulf Common Market Committee according to a specific timetable before the end of 2024, according to SPA.

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Last January, the Saudi Finance Minister, Muhammad Al-Jadaan, stressed the need to hasten coordination between Gulf countries to reach economic unity by 2025.

At the time, Al-Jadaan said: “There are vigorous steps to be taken to achieve coordination, integration and interdependence among the GCC states in all fields, and to remove obstacles that prevent this.”

At the last Gulf summit, which was held in December 2021, the leaders of the six Gulf states – Saudi Arabia, Qatar, the UAE, Bahrain, Kuwait and Oman – stressed the need to achieve unity in foreign policies and in the economic and military fields.

Since its establishment in 1981, the path of the GCC witnessed a number of steps towards achieving Gulf economic unity, starting with the establishment of a free trade zone in 1983.