[14] Other major parts of the economy include refining and chemical manufacturing from the oil reserves, much of which is vertically integrated in the state-owned enterprise, Saudi Aramco.

Petroleum in Saudi Arabia is not only plentiful but also located under pressure close to the earth's surface, which makes it less expensive and more profitable to extract compared to other places.

The government has been encouraging the growth of the private sector for many years to decrease the kingdom's dependence on oil and to increase employment opportunities for the swelling Saudi population.

With its absolute monarchy, large state sector, and supply of welfare benefits, the Saudi economy has been described asː A bewildering (at least to outsiders) combination of a feudal fealty system and a more modern political patronage one.

By the same token, the government bureaucracy is a maze of overlapping or conflicting power centers under the patronage of various royal princes with their own priorities and agendas to pursue and dependents to satisfy.

[30][31] Moreover, in 1951, Aramco started operating the Trans-Arabian Pipeline that moved oil from the eastern region of Saudi Arabia to the Mediterranean Sea through Jordan, Syria, and Lebanon.

[46] Saudi Arabia was a key player in coordinating the successful 1999 campaign of OPEC and other oil-producing countries to raise the oil price to its highest level since the (Persian) Gulf War by managing petroleum supply and production.

[62] The government has sought to allocate its petroleum income to transform its relatively undeveloped, oil-based economy into a modern industrial state, while maintaining the kingdom's traditional Islamic values and customs.

[63] The fifth plan (1990–95) emphasized consolidation of the country's defences; improved and more efficient government social services; regional development; and, most importantly, creating greater private-sector employment opportunities for Saudis by reducing the number of foreign workers.

Delay in Aramco's initial public offering further demonstrated a lack of urgency to privatize, even though in July 2018, the International Monetary Fund urged accelerating the process.

[79][80] The government has announced a succession of plans since 2000 to deal with the imbalance by "Saudization" of the economy, but the foreign workforce and unemployment has continued to grow.

[83] Saudi Arabia has natural resources other than oil, including small mineral deposits of gold, silver, iron, copper, zinc, manganese, tungsten, lead, sulfur, phosphate, soapstone, and feldspar.

[85] In 2008, the "Initiative for Saudi Agricultural Investment Abroad" was launched, leading to extensive billion-dollar purchases of large tracts of land around the world, including in Ethiopia, Indonesia, Mali, Senegal, and Sudan.

Competing industrializing nations with food security problems seeking agricultural land include China, South Korea, and India, as well as the Persian Gulf States of Kuwait, Qatar, and the UAE.

[86][87][88][89][90] In 2010, the KSU Gazal-1, an SUV built by students at King Saud University, became the first mass-produced vehicle manufactured domestically in Saudi Arabia.

[95] Saudi Arabia's private sector is dominated by a handful of big businesses in the service sector, primarily in construction and real estate, such as Olayan, Zamil, Almarai, Mobily, STC, SABIC, Sadara, Halliburton, Baker Hughes, Flynas, Hilton, Zain, Yanbu Cement, Alhokair, MBC, Mahfouz, Al Rajhi, and Alfanar.

[96] From 2003 to 2013, "several key services" were privatized—municipal water supply, electricity, telecommunications—and parts of education and health care, traffic control, and car accident reporting were also privatized.

[99] To provide the best support for the private sector and entrepreneurs, the kingdom announced a decision approved by the Saudi Cabinet in July 2019 allowing businesses in the country to be given the option to remain open 24 hours a day.

"Saudi reserves are steadily being depleted, and no significant new discoveries have been found to replace them," according to Middle East journalist Karen House.

[118] After 2015, Saudi Arabia embarked on several initiatives, including Vision 2030, aimed at reducing its dependency on oil by investing in other sectors such as tourism, entertainment, and technology.

However, "employers complained bitterly about the lack of skills among young locals; years of rote-learning and religious instruction fail to prepare them for the job market."

[125] According to scholar David Commins, the kingdom depends "on huge numbers of expatriate workers to fill technical and administrative positions" in part because of an educational system that, despite "generous budgets", has suffered from "poorly trained teachers, low retention rates, lack of rigorous standards, weak scientific and technical instruction and excessive attention to religious subjects".

[134] Business journalist Karen House criticized the Saudi bureaucracy, explaining that someone seeking to start a business in Saudi Arabia: has to complete innumerable applications and documents at multiple layers of multiple ministries, which invariably requires seeking favours from various patronage networks and accumulating obligations along the way, most probably including having to hire less-than-competent dependents of his patrons.

In December 2011, days after the Arab Spring uprisings, the Saudi interior ministry detained reporter Feros Boqna and two colleagues (Hussam al-Drewesh and Khaled al-Rasheed) and held them for almost two weeks for questioning after they uploaded a 10-minute video on the topic (Mal3ob 3alena, or 'We are being cheated') to YouTube.

[149] However, as part of the economic reforms undertaken by the government to enhance national living standards, new funding solutions have been established to boost the mortgages for existing and new borrowers to help finance their housing plans.

[151][152] To deal with the key "land banking" issue, the Minister of Housing suggested in 2013 that vacant property within city limits could be subject to a tax.

According to the International Institute for Management Development, Saudi Arabia experienced the largest improvement in business competitiveness of all countries in 2019; the kingdom rose 13 places to 26th in the world.

[167] With a total of 291 foreign investor licenses issued in the second quarter of 2019, the kingdom has witnessed an increase in international investment, reflecting the economic reforms under the Saudi Vision 2030.

[175] On 16 November 2020, Saudi Aramco announced hiring banks to sell dollar-denominated bonds with the aim of improving finances after the coronavirus pandemic caused a sharp fall in the global demand for crude oil.

[178] The Saudi Arabian Basic Industries Corporation (SABIC) was established by a royal decree in 1976 to produce chemicals, polymers, and fertilizers.