Saudi Arabia, Pakistan to sign Barrick deal in few weeks, says Al Faleh

Minister for Investment of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, Sheikh Khalid Bin Abdul Aziz Al Faleh, said on Thursday that Saudi Arabia’s Manara Minerals will sign a deal with Barrick Gold and Pakistan’s State Owned Enterprises (SOEs) in the coming few weeks.

Addressing the Pak-Saudi Business Forum 2024 in Islamabad, the minister, who arrived in Pakistan on a three-day official visit on Wednesday, informed that Manara Minerals Investment Company (Manara), a new venture between the Saudi Arabian Mining Company (Ma’aden) and the Public Investment Fund (PIF), is eager to start a number of mining initiatives.

“But the first one we hope to conclude in the next weeks is for them to enter the Reko Diq project with the SOEs of Pakistan and Barrick Gold, and seize our partnership,” he said.

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Reko Diq is owned 50% by Barrick, 25% by three federal state-owned enterprises, 15% by the Province of Balochistan on a fully funded basis and 10% by the Province of Balochistan on a free carried basis.

Apart from Reko Diq, the Saudi Arabian minister showed interest in investing in renewable energy projects and improving trade ties with Pakistan.

Addressing the business forum, he said that Saudi Arabia is the largest construction site in the world “make no mistake about it”.

“We will be in the next few years, awarding construction and material procurement contracts reaching about $1.8 trillion. The value of construction and E&P procurement will reach about $200 billion annually year after year.”

“Fortunately for our partners in Pakistan, a lot of the input into those contracts is going to be imported, and we want it to be imported from Pakistan all things being equal,” he said.

Talking about the energy sector, the Saudi minister said: “The big area of growth is renewable energy i.e. solar, wind, hydrogen”.

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“We want to support Pakistan continuing on its economic stabilization.

“Without Pakistan reaching its economic stability, it is very difficult to do things together.

“What has been done in the short period of last two years is quite impressive,” he said while lauding the role of Minister of Finance Muhammad Aurangzeb.

“We think it is only the beginning, because once the momentum is created there is no stopping you, and Saudi Arabia has been and will continue to be Pakistan’s partner to achieve that economic stability.”

Al Faleh informed that during his meeting with the COAS General Asim Munir, the army chief “expressed his commitment that he will set to it that all matters of red tape be replaced with a red carpet treatment for Saudi investments”.

The Saudi minister noted that the reforms taken by incumbent Pakistan’s government “will undertake to make Pakistan not only one of the highest return investment destination, but one that is low risk and very much financeable”.

He informed that 27 Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) worth over $2 billion will be signed between Saudi companies and Pakistan. Over 50 Saudi companies are part of the delegation visiting Pakistan, he noted.

“Trade between Saudi Arabia and Pakistan has already increased significantly, from $3 billion in 2019 to $5.4 billion, an increase of 80%”.

“The number of Pakistani investment licenses in Saudi Arabia has more than doubled, reaching 2,000 in the last couple of years. Moreover, FDI stock in Saudi Arabia of Pakistani investment is already exceeding $1.6 billion.”

He said that the Saudi authorities remain committed to and are extremely encouraged by Crown Prince Muhammad bin Salman’s $5 billion investment in Pakistan announced during Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif’s visit to KSA, which was weeks after Shehbaz was elected as PM.

“There are essentially no limits to what Saudi Arabia and Pakistan can do in the economic sphere, just like there is no limit to our friendship,” he said.

The visiting minister said that Saudi Vision 2030 is not only doing well “but is ahead of schedule, and we are moving to start thinking about the next phase of envisioning the future”.

“No single country, no matter how rich, or how strong financially can compete in the global world we live in today.

“You need demographics, live markets, human resources in addition to capital, and Pakistan and Saudi Arabia provides that complementarity, scale.

“We see that Pakistan is uniquely positioned geographically, with your location extending from the Arabian Sea all the way to the heart of Asia i.e. Central Asia, China, and Caspian countries, are markets and resources available to Saudi investors to reach through partnering with our Pakistani friends.”

The Saudi minister will have a busy schedule in Pakistan along with representatives of private companies and top government officials of KSA in this visit bilateral trade and investment between Pakistan and Saudi Arabia, mutual agreements and important memorandums of understanding will also be signed.