First up: Oman’s steady, if bumpy, transition

Sultan Haitham bin Tariq Al Said inherited an economy in trouble when he succeeded Sultan Qaboos in January 2020. Oman’s gross domestic product had contracted by 0.8% in 2019, burdened by a bloated bureaucracy, massive debt and deficits, and low oil prices. And then COVID-19 hit.

Oman has been praised for its handling of the pandemic. And despite COVID-19, Haitham has mostly stuck to a challenging reform program that was just getting started under his predecessor. There have been forced retirements in the civil service, marking a shift to a leaner, younger and more technocratic government. A value added tax has been introduced. The government established two new agencies, the Oman Investment Authority, to improve management of public assets, and Energy Development of Oman, to manage and finance investments in energy. Sebastian Castelier has the story here from August 2020.

While Oman’s economy contracted by a sharp 6.4% in 2020, the contraction was less severe than anticipated. This year the economy is expecting modest growth of 1.8%, according to the International Monetary Fund, and next year it’s on track for a robust 7.4%, the highest IMF projection for the region.