The E-Commerce Council has in collaboration with the Saudi-British Joint Business Council hosted recently an event in London on "The Role of E-Commerce in Building the Saudi-British Economic Partnership".
The event was attended by a high-level Saudi delegation led by H. E. Dr. Majid Abdullah Al-Qasabi, Minister of Commerce and Head of E-Commerce Council, as well as members of the council, which includes leaders from 11 government entities.
Promising opportunities offered by the Vision 2030 were promoted in areas like digital infrastructure, fintech, e-payment, logistics and transportation, last-mile delivery solutions, as well as quality of life e-services such as e-health, e-education, entertainment, gaming, and so on. Moreover, bilateral collaboration and partnership were addressed in light of high growth achieved by e-commerce.
Al-Qasabi said the Kingdom is one of the top ten countries that have seen development in the field of e-commerce, with an annual growth rate of more than 32 percent. The event was attended by the Ambassador of the Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques to the UK, HRH Prince Khalid bin Bandar bin Sultan bin Abdulaziz, and the Honorary President of the Saudi-British Joint Business Council, Baroness Elizabeth Symons.
The Minister of Commerce underlined that one of the National Transformation Program's goals is to strengthen and improve the e-commerce ecosystem as part of Vision 2030 objectives, pointing out that e-commerce plays a critical role in boosting the national economy.
Dr. Eman Al-Mutairi, Deputy Minister of Commerce and General Supervisor of the E-Commerce Council, emphasized the Saudi reforms in the field of e-commerce and the development potential in this sector, given the expansion of this market, whose volume reached 162 billion riyals in 2021.
The delegation will learn about various commerce and technology accelerators and incubators, including "TechUK" and "Level39". The former is a collaboration between the British government and 850 members from various industries that strive to design and expedite commerce policies. The latter is an innovation hub and a business accelerator that specializes in cybersecurity, financial technologies, retail, and smart cities.
Leaders from the Saudi delegation who took part in the event were from: Ministry of Commerce; Ministry of Investment; Ministry of Transport and Logistic Services; Saudi Central Bank; Communications and Information Technology Commission; Zakat, Tax and Customs Authority; Small and Medium Enterprises Authority "Monsha'at"; Saudi Authority for Data and Artificial Intelligence “SDAIA”; National Competitiveness Center; Saudi Center for Economic Business; the Saudi Post "SABL", in addition to 120 company leaders from the two countries.