Economic Confidence Up in MENA Region

摘要

While the US and Europe continued to struggle with the impact of the subprime crisis, countries of the Middle East and North Africa have been looking at a quite different 2008, one that will be memorable for the fact that the oil economies had earned as much by the end of June as they had in all of 2007. That is adding to the confidence of the six member states of the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) that they can transform their economies over the long term. There are downsides. All the GCC economies are suffering from high inflation, driven either by their own rapid expansion or by the higher cost of oil and food. But confidence in the region's economic future has never been higher. The massive rise in hydrocarbon revenues is giving rise to extravagant expectations. One is that the value of the sovereign wealth funds - with those of the GCC making a major contribution - could be greater than the GDP of the United States within a decade.