How Saudi Arabia Contributes to Shaping World’s Future?

The ninth of last September was not an ordinary day. Following a scorching summer, New Delhi residents found a breather in alleys and public squares to play cricket and other popular games. The elderly could go out to enjoy the pleasant sun.

On the other hand, the security authorities were mobilized because of a high-level security mission that required raising the levels of readiness and surrounding important buildings and vehicles.

The soldiers lined up parallel to the age-old Jumna River, so that the G20 summit would end well, especially that India is hosting it for the first time in its history.

Project of the Century

However, this summit was not the most major thing happening in India, as it had a historic decision to make, for it became the capital from which the “Project of the Century” was launched.

The project was considered by economists as a lifeline from the grinding global crisis and by diplomats as good news for a bullet-and-guns-free international cooperation. Politicians believed that this summit was the nucleus of a new world to be formed after the Russian-Ukrainian war.

The godfather of the Saudi vision, Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, unveiled the details of the project during the 18th summit when he announced an economic corridor starting from India, passing through the UAE, Saudi Arabia and Jordan, until it reaches Europe.

The objectives of this cooperation, which is approved by the G20 leaders, are to enhance economic connectivity, contribute to developing infrastructure, including railways and ports’ linkage, increase the passage of goods and services and enhance trade exchange between the countries concerned.

Furthermore, the cooperation aims to extend pipelines for exporting and importing electricity and hydrogen to enhance the security of energy supply and data transmission over a cross-border network, according to the British newspaper Financial Times.

Apart from the project’s economic profits, there are political indications that were the most important.

Firstly, it is rare to hold a global meeting that is intended for implementing development projects, improving the quality of people’s lives and securing their future.

Secondly, the United Nations no longer issues global resolutions, as usual for the last century, but it is the G20 that issues them now, meaning that the G20 has become a real representative of the world’s major countries and its future map.

Thirdly, and most importantly, for the first, time there is an Arab state among the great powers, Saudi Arabia, which carries the hopes of all Arabs in the international community.

Arabs- From Spectators to Players

These three axes prompted the writer Ghassan Charbel, editor-in-chief of Asharq Al-Awsat newspaper, to say that the Group of Twenty, at its last summit, drew the real future through progress, technological development and the fight against poverty.

It became clear that the world is passing through a transitional phase burdened with challenges. Most importantly, according to “Charbel”, Arabs no longer have to adapt to a world made by others because, thanks to the role of Saudi Arabia, they have become influential globally. Saudi Arabia succeeded in building a progress model within the framework of Vision 2030, enabling her to build strategic partnerships with the big players.

What Charbel said was not strange; in times of global devastation, Saudi Arabia has always been the hand that builds and plants trees. Since 2015, this path has become clearer through an integrated strategy in which the Kingdom has put humanity first.

Since managing the internal affairs is the basis for progress and at times when some Arab countries were plagued by perilous turmoil, the Kingdom, under the leadership of King Salman and Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, may God protect them, was shaping the future for its young generations.

This is through a vision that includes all aspects of their lives and ways to improve them, starting with a strong non-oil-reliant economy, to green suitable environment.

KSA Efforts During Covid-19

In conjunction with Vision 2030 successes and its achievement of tangible steps, Saudi Arabia’s global role was growing until 2019, when Coronavirus swept across the globe. Many countries were forced to close their borders in order to protect their citizens, but there were countries that refused and preferred to avoid economic losses at the expense of their citizens’ health.

Apart from the fact that the Kingdom has not hesitated to protect the lives of its citizens, residents and even violators of residency regulations, she closed the borders and implemented a globally hailed health plan.

Globally, Saudi Arabia played the most prominent role through the World Health Organization’s support of $100 million to provide quality services to citizens in poor countries. A step that prompted Tedros Adhanom, Director-General of the World Health Organization, to express his gratitude for Riyadh’s role in an official statement.

The Kingdom’s real test was the 2020 Hajj season, as many countries bet that the performance of this sacred ritual (pilgrimage) would affect its considerable revenues.

Despite this and the financial returns of receiving nearly two million pilgrims, the Kingdom set an example by sacrificing all of this for the sake of pilgrims’ health. Proceeding from that, it limited the Hajj to residents and with strict health requirements that led to recording no infections this year.

Saudi Arabia’s Climate Action

The efforts did not stop, from protecting human’s health to shaping a bright future. This time, it was through excelling in combating the effects of climate change.

After a meeting in 2021 with Russia, China and America, the Kingdom launched the Saudi Green Initiative and then the Middle East Green Initiative. The two initiatives targeted planting 50 billion trees, including ten billion trees in Saudi Arabia alone.

In addition to cutting carbon emissions by 60% to reach zero by 2060 and among many countries that have bragged about being great powers and working for humanity, the Gulf country is the only one that has made and implemented the plan. its efforts to develop the plan are still underway.

Of course, these were only subject headings of major projects that coincided with other efforts, such as international meetings to establish world peace, like the Jeddah summit recently, reconstruction and relief efforts for instance the earthquakes in Turkey and Morocco, and now a global initiative that works to improve people’s lives, from India to Europe passing through the Arab Gulf countries.

Thus, there is no longer room for asking how Saudi Arabia became the greatest success story in the 21st century, as Prince Mohammed bin Salman explained in his interview with Fox News a few days ago.

The Kingdom attaches importance to the Saudis first, then the citizens of the world, and everything else at the bottom of the priority list. That is an economic recipe that only a professional cook can follow- a truly professional one.

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