What Was the Original Goal of Vision 2030?

What was the original goal of Vision 2030? Dr. Aziz Alghashian, specialist on Saudi Arabia's foreign policy, answers.

Transcript

00:00What was the original thinking behind Vision 2030?

00:03How was the Vision born and what was its original goal?

00:06Well, thank you very much for having me.

00:07It's a great pleasure to join you.

00:09I think, you know, I appreciate very much the opportunity

00:13to really rehash why 2030 Vision has been kind of pushed

00:21and declared and conceived,

00:23because I think no matter how many times we talk about it,

00:25I think it's worth going back to the origins.

00:27So thank you very much for this opportunity.

00:30And I would say, I think it's, you know, to be very direct,

00:34it's clear that it's about restructuring not only the Saudi economy,

00:39but really restructuring the Saudi state.

00:41I think for the past decade, there's been a lot of discussions

00:44regarding the sustainability of how the Saudi economy will continue

00:50in its form that was very oil-centric or natural resource-based.

01:00And it's, you know, it was clear that I think it was very unsustainable.

01:07And I think with the change of leadership and the change of kind of the dynamics,

01:13both the international dynamics and inside Saudi Arabia politically,

01:18there was then a real push and an institutionalization of this kind of change.

01:28And I think this is what really conceived, I think, 2030.

01:312030 really is about reconstructing not only the state,

01:35not only the economy, but reconstructing the Saudi state.

01:39Because I think, you know, without reconstructing or addressing core issues of society,

01:48addressing a lot of the tapped sources that have been unused,

01:53the tapped manpower and womenpower that have been unused,

01:56you know, restructuring the economy in itself is just a very difficult task.

02:00So I think that's really about, in other words,

02:03to catapult Saudi Arabia into the 21st century and beyond.