Saudi and UAE ports perfectly placed for China Belt and Road Initiative expat jobs

Saudi Arabia and UAE ports could bring an expat job bonanza due to China’s Belt and Road initiative.

The five massive seaports in Saudi and the UAE are essentially staging posts along extended trade routes connecting the Far East with the West. At present underused, they offer expanded economic opportunities due to the need for businesses providing import/export services, marine insurance, berths for cargo vessels and much more. Most jobs at every level are now taken by expats, but Saudization is a threat to the present day labour market, especially at executive level. Salvation may be on the way from an unlikely direction – the Chinese Belt and Road trade route now under construction across Asia.

Provided the advanced technology now driving world businesses as well as the development of transportation is installed and understood, the five ports could become an essential hub for the automated management of goods from China and the rest of Asia via the East Asian maritime route. The technological challenges would require large numbers of expat professionals experienced in the needs of giant shipping concerns, creating a jobs bonanza for the qualified and experienced. Manual labour needs would diminish as automation increases, and if the challenge wasn’t accepted due to nationalistic views, the five ports would miss out on the business opportunities of a lifetime rather than playing an essential and lucrative role in China’s success.

At the present time, significant underutilisation of several of the ports’ facilities is a fact, with an average of 25 per cent of total capacity the norm. Damman, Jeddah and the UAE’s Khor Fakkann are seeing a decline in demand placing them in the top ten losers of container volumes in 2017. All five ports have the capacity to handle anything the Belt and Road initiative throws at them, provided they upgrade their technology and improve their automation to the level of their European counterparts. Not taking advantage of expat professional experience and knowledge will, in the long term, hurt Saudi and Emirati nationals as shippers and container shipping companies opt for other more efficient ports, taking their money with them.