NUSANED™: SABIC’s Local Content Initiative Supports Saudi Arabia’s Economic Development

Operating in around 50 countries across the world and with 65 world-class manufacturing and compounding plants across the Middle East, Asia, Europe and the Americas, SABIC is a truly global business. However, we have never lost sight of our roots in Saudi Arabia, which is why we are fully committed to supporting the Kingdom’s bold and ambitious economic transformation plan: Vision 2030. The plan opens broad vistas of possibilities for strengthening Saudi Arabia’s local economy and business capabilities across every industry sector.

The four pillars of NUSANED™ and the ecosystem they have helped to create have boosted the contribution of the private sector and small and medium sized enterprises (SMEs) to the GDP by about SAR 12 billion since inception of the initiative in 2018 until 2022. They also generated over 19,416 jobs for citizens over these years.

What is local content? Local content drives domestic value creation, through the development of a domestic workforce. Local content programs build and develop local skills and support the prioritization of local manpower and local manufacturing. These programs are designed to drive investment, economic diversification and workforce development within the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia.

NUSANED™

In order to achieve the ambitions of SABIC’s LCBDU, we initiated “NUSANED™” – our first integrated localization program.

WHAT IS NUSANED™? NUSANED™ brings together the public and private sector, helping small and medium sized enterprises (SMES) get started while enabling more established ones to grow further. NUSANED does this by: Supporting local business and procurement initiatives, in turn reducing unemployment, and boosting Saudi Arabia’s national GDP Supporting exports through strategic cooperation with the Saudi Export Development Authority (SEDA)

NUSANED™ is central to our local content programme, bringing together the public and private sector, helping small and medium sized enterprises (SMEs) get started and enabling more established ones to grow further. By supporting local business and procurement initiatives, we are investing in SMEs and helping reduce unemployment, while simultaneously building local capabilities and boosting national GDP.

NUSANED™ is aimed at addressing some of the challenges investors and entrepreneurs face, from idea generation to the execution of the idea. In order to carry out the initiative, four key pillars were identified:

• Entema: a portal that provides investors and entrepreneurs with a space to explore opportunities and test their viability and attractiveness, in turn enabling them to receive SABIC support through DA’AEM. These opportunities are tested on the following basis:
  • Socio-economic impact on KSA which includes GDP contribution to the national economy, number of jobs created and trade balance improvement
  • Long term competitiveness and sustainability of the opportunity which factors in local and global market size, profitability and the management team profile
• DA’AEM: designed to execute the proposed support packages identified during the Entema process. These packages will differ in scale and are dependent on the socio-economic impact they have on Saudi Arabia. Examples of DA’AEM packages include:
  • The supply of materials and services to SABIC
  • Product offtake from SABIC
  • Technical support, products application and technology commercialization
  • Access to world class practices at SABIC
• Access to Finance: which aims to provide financing for investment, through the right authorities, for NUSANED™ supported opportunities. SABIC has signed MoUs with several stakeholders to ensure the required support is possible.
• Muahal: which aims to develop the technical and leadership capabilities of the local workforce for NUSANED™ supported opportunities or for companies endorsed by SABIC LCBDU. This is to ensure that investors have the right workforce to execute the opportunity in a competitive and sustainable way.

These four pillars work together to ensure the success of NUSANED™. The ultimate goal of NUSANED™ is to promote the localization of materials and services, ultimately reducing the reliance on imports and supporting capable and competitive local manufacturers while stimulating national employment.

The four pillars of NUSANED™ and the ecosystem they have helped to create seek to boost the contribution of the private sector and small and medium sized enterprises (SMEs) to the GDP by about US$ 1.6 billion during 2020 alone. They also created generating over 7,900 jobs for citizens (during 2020).

Complementing this, our global partnerships and presence in more than 50 countries help attract investments and bring international expertise to Saudi Arabia. Through these efforts, we have enhanced the capabilities of local industries to grow and compete, and have made significant progress in enabling investment, lowering unemployment and increasing the contribution of SMEs to national GDP.

We take pride in supporting capable and competitive local manufacturers and stimulating national employment. The benefits of driving local content through initiatives like NUSANED™ are clear: establishing a sustainable and diverse economy underpinned by a strong domestic workforce, which in turn will drive domestic value creation in the Kingdom and improve global competitiveness.