The Ministry of Commerce and Industry (MoCI) has held the strategic planning forum for 2026, over a period of three days, with the participation of supervisory leadership and employees from the Ministry’s various sectors. According to a statement issued by the Ministry, the meeting focused on preparations for the forum, its key themes, and enhancing the readiness of the Ministry’s units to support the implementation of the Third National Development Strategy 2024–2030 and the Ministry of Commerce and Industry Strategy (2024–2030).
The forum was chaired by H.E. Mr. Mohammed bin Hassan Al Malki, Undersecretary of the Ministry of Commerce and Industry, with the participation of Assistant Undersecretaries and Department Directors. In his opening remarks, His Excellency affirmed that 2025 constituted an important phase, during which the Ministry achieved accomplishments that contributed to improving the business environment, developing services, and enhancing investment attractiveness. He commended the efforts of work teams and the level of integration among the Ministry’s sectors, which contributed to achieving these results and established a solid foundation for moving forward with the implementation of the 2026 plan.
Presentation of the Ministry’s Strategic Perspective
Ms. Fatma Al Alamri, Director of the Planning, Quality, and Innovation Department, presented the Ministry’s strategic direction for 2026. She noted that the Ministry’s Strategy 2024–2030 was developed directly based on the objectives of the Third National Development Strategy and the relevant sectoral strategies, in line with the Ministry’s mandates. The presentation also highlighted the Ministry’s leadership role in achieving the national outcome related to sustainable economic growth, the expected results of implementing the Ministry’s strategy, and the role of sectors in supporting the achievement of these results.
Sectoral Presentation Sessions
The forum included presentations of the plans of all executive sector departments and shared services, comprising more than 200 projects, including 32 projects under the Third National Development Strategy and 173 operational projects. Discussions also addressed mechanisms for monitoring implementation and measuring performance, as well as ways to enhance integration across different sectors.
Industry & Business Development Sector
H.E. Mr. Saleh Majed Al Khulaifi, Assistant Undersecretary for Industry and Business Development, delivered a comprehensive presentation on the pivotal role played by the sector in supporting manufacturing industries and business development, confirming the sector’s contribution to six of the ten strategic outcomes of the Ministry of Commerce and Industry.
In 2025, the sector witnessed notable progress in developing the industrial environment through the launch of key initiatives, including: unifying industrial land management procedures under the umbrella of Manateq, improving environmental permitting procedures, assessing factory readiness to adopt Industry 4.0 tools (SIRI), launching the updated version of the Industrial Activities Guide, and introducing four Public–Private Partnership projects, one of which has already been signed. The sector also achieved positive economic performance, with the first and second quarters of 2025 recording better results compared to previous years in terms of the contribution of manufacturing to GDP.
The Assistant Undersecretary reviewed the main targets for 2026, including raising the compound annual growth rate of manufacturing GDP to 3.4%, increasing customer satisfaction with industrial services to 85% or higher, maintaining 100% digital transformation in industrial development services, and empowering national products by increasing the application of customs measures to combat harmful practices and increasing sales of national products during National Product Week. The directors of the Industry Affairs and Business Development Sector then reviewed more than 35 operational and strategic projects to achieve the sector’s objectives.
Trade Sector
H.E. Mr. Ayed Manahi Al-Qahtani, Assistant Undersecretary for Trade Affairs, delivered a comprehensive presentation addressing the achievements realized in 2025, which reflected significant progress in facilitating the business environment and improving service efficiency. The sector succeeded in accelerating registration and licensing procedures by adding 13 new services to the Single Window and achieving 89% electronic transactions of total received applications. It also raised compliance with service-level agreements with government entities to 83%, increased customer satisfaction to 94% through the Single Window and 98% through Government Services Centers.
The sector also worked to combat the phenomenon of fictitious commercial licenses by canceling more than 10,000 licenses, and strengthened the intellectual property ecosystem through international agreements.
In 2026, the Trade Affairs Sector will focus on improving the efficiency of the investor journey and enhancing competitiveness by reducing company establishment timelines, increasing digital transformation rates, raising customer satisfaction with sector services, integrating additional entities into the Single Window to enhance government integration, and strengthening the protection of intellectual property rights. The sector’s directors then reviewed more than 30 operational and strategic projects to achieve sector objectives.
Consumer Protection Sector
H.E. Mr. Hassan bin Sultan Al Ghanem presented the sector’s achievements for 2025, which focused on consumer protection and strengthening market confidence through a smart and effective regulatory system. Achievements included increased readiness of the supply system, growth in the number of food and feed distributors, handling complaints within targeted timeframes and activating digital channels for consumer services, a notable increase in inspection operations, and enhancing competition by introducing voluntary review services for mergers and acquisitions and accepting economic concentration applications.
For 2026, the sector aims to establish an integrated digital system for strategic stockpiles, maintain a security level of 80% or higher for all commodities, increase digital transformation to 90%, conduct 106,000 inspection operations to improve the quality of goods and services, resolve 90% of complaints within the specified timeframe, raise company compliance with competition regulations and improve complaint responsiveness to up to 100%, enhance awareness of consumer rights, and reduce anti-competitive practices. The directors of the Consumer Affairs Sector reviewed more than 35 operational and strategic projects to achieve these objectives.
Shared Services Sector
H.E. Mr. Ali Khaled Al Khulaifi, Assistant Undersecretary for Shared Services, delivered a comprehensive presentation on the pivotal role played by the sector in enabling the Ministry’s operational framework and enhancing digital, human, and organizational readiness. He confirmed that the sector contributes directly to three of the Ministry’s main strategic outcomes.
In 2025, the sector achieved several notable accomplishments that enhanced government efficiency, including the launch of the virtual assistant “Saif”, implementation of Phase One of the Unified System, automation of 715 Ministry services, achieving first place and the Golden Shield in the 11th Cybersecurity Drill, completion of the organizational and job structure project, implementation of 42 training programs to build employee capabilities, and reaching 975 million views of Ministry content across social media platforms.
His Excellency explained that the Shared Services Sector is preparing for 2026 with an ambitious plan aimed at increasing digital transformation of services from 71% to 92%, expanding government services on the mobile application from 59 to 120 services, raising employee satisfaction with the work environment to 85% or higher, achieving full business continuity (zero system outages) across Ministry systems, enhancing institutional image and increasing media engagement by more than 15% compared to the previous year, attracting talent, and raising the leadership readiness index to above 90%. Finally, the directors of the sector’s four departments—Human Resources, Information Systems, Public Relations and Communications, and Financial and Administrative Affairs—presented their 2026 operational plans, comprising approximately 50 projects.
