[2] Establishing a skilled native-born workforce is one of the most critical challenges facing countries of the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) from an economic security and a social inclusion perspective.
Integration of skilled native-born workforce and reduction of dependence on the expatriate workers has been on the top of agendas of the GCC states.
With a growing population of young nationals graduating every year, there is an urgent need to integrate them into the job market especially in the private sector to strike the right balance in representing local talent in the workforce.
To meet those challenges, governments adopted human resources development strategies (also known as Bahrainization, Emiratisation, Kuwaitization, Omanization, Qatarization, and Saudization) that target the employment of native-born workforce through various incentives, regulations, policies, educational reforms, and economic diversification plans.
[5] A report from Kasim Randeree, senior researcher at the University of Oxford, notes that the GCC states have all “become reliant on migrant workers” in recent decades, with Qatar and the UAE “at the extremity of the situation[6]”.