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Saudi Arabia
POPULATION
Saudis and Non-Saudis
Estimates of the population holding Saudi citizenship have varied
widely. Official figures published by the Saudi government indicated
a population of 14,870,000 in 1990. In the same year, however,
estimates by one Western source inside the kingdom were as low
as 6 million. United Nations estimates were slightly less than
the official Saudi figure. Based on the official Saudi figure,
at the 1990 rate of growth, a population of 20 million was projected
by the year 2000. The 1992 Saudi census indicated an indigenous
population of 12.3 million people and a growth rate of 3.3 percent.
In addition to the population holding Saudi citizenship, there
were large numbers of foreign residents in the kingdom. In 1985
the number of foreigners was estimated at 4,563,000, with a total
foreign work force of 3,522,700. In 1990 the number of foreigners
had risen to 5,300,000. In 1990 the greatest number of foreign
workers came from Arabic-speaking countries, chiefly Egypt, followed
by Yemen, Jordan, Syria, and Kuwait, then Pakistan, India, the
Philippines, Sri Lanka, and the Republic of Korea (South Korea).
About 180,000 came from European countries and 92,000 from North
America. Between 1985 and 1990, the number of foreigners employed
in the economy rose, in contrast to the substantial decline expected
and called for in the Fourth Development Plan, 1985-90 (see Five-Year
Plans , ch. 3). This increase was reflected in the number of residence
permits issued to foreigners, which rose from 563,747 in 1985
to 705,679 in 1990. A goal of Saudi planners continued to be a
reduction in the number of foreign workers, and the Fifth Development
Plan, 1990- 95, projected a 1.2 percent annual decline over five
years, or a drop of almost 250,000 foreign workers. The 1992 census
gave the number of resident foreigners as 4.6 million.
Whether such a decline could occur, or had already begun to occur
in 1992, was questionable. From an economic point of view, there
were difficulties in increasing the number of Saudi citizens in
the work force. One difficulty was that potential Saudi workers
for low-skilled and other jobs were becoming less competitive
with foreigners in the private-sector labor market. Wages of non-Saudi
workers had been adjusted downward since the early 1980s, and,
with a ready supply of non-Saudis willing to work in low-skilled
occupations, the wage gap between Saudis and non-Saudi workers
was widening. In addition, as the government recognized, Saudi
secondary school and university graduates were not always as qualified
as foreign workers for employment in the private sector. Although
the Riyadh-based Institute of Public Administration offered training
programs to increase the competitiveness of Saudi nationals, the
programs had difficulty attracting participants.
Social constraints on the employment of women (7 percent of the
work force in 1990; 93 percent of the national work force were
men) also hampered indigenization of the work force. Government
and private groups actively sought ways to expand the areas in
which women might work. The issue became more pressing as the
number of female university graduates continued to increase at
a faster rate than the number of male graduates.
Although such economic and social pressures have militated against
increasing the number of Saudi nationals in the work force, the
desired decline in foreign labor may have occurred as a result
of new residency requirements imposed in the summer of 1990 to
encourage the departure of Yemenis, the second largest segment
of the foreign labor population. As a punitive response to the
government of Yemen's sympathy with Iraq, the Saudi government
issued a decree requiring Yemenis, who were previously exempt
from regulations governing foreigners' doing business in the kingdom,
to obtain residence permits. Subsequently, about 1 million Yemenis
left the country. Only three weeks after the decree was issued,
the Riyadh Chamber of Commerce announced that there were almost
250,000 jobs, especially in the area of small retail businesses,
available for young Saudis as a result of the regulation of foreign
residence visas. It was unclear in 1992 whether the types of employment
and businesses vacated by Yemenis would prove attractive to Saudi
job seekers, or whether these jobs would be recirculated into
the foreign labor market.
Data as of December 1992
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