Saudi Arabia

Baked goods is one of the most prominent offerings in the packaged food industry since bread and pastries are consumed daily in Saudi Arabia. Of all the offerings, frozen baked goods continues to record increasing values sales, mainly due to rises in...

Breakfast cereals maintained a healthy growth in Saudi Arabia, benefiting from being a traditional Saudi breakfast choice. A factor that has helped support breakfast cereal growth is women joining the workforce, which will consequently increase their...

Shelf stable beans has a high level of value sales in processed vegetables, boosted by the high level sold and consumed in to create foul medames – a traditional stew cooked with beans, cumin, vegetable oil and blended with different herbs and ...

Frozen processed poultry value sales increased, primarily due to the removal of a government subsidy for domestic players, that provided support to lower the cost of imported animal feed, vaccines and equipment, in turn assisting in keeping ...

Dried pasta recorded the highest retail current value sales growth in 2019, as young Saudi Arabians continued to opt for a more Western lifestyle through the consumption of international cuisines. Consumers are also being introduced to Italian meals ...

Credit card transactions registered very strong growth in 2019 and this can be attributed in no small part to the fact that Saudi consumers are starting to use their credit cards to make micro payments. Although credit cards have traditionally been ...

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Towards the end of the review period, pre-paid cards received a major boost from changes to the law in Saudi Arabia which now require all those who employ domestic staff to pay their workers via electronic transfer to pre-paid payroll or salary ...

Charge cards continued to register further declines in the number of cards in circulation and transactions value in 2019. The category is already far smaller than either debit cards or credit cards. Moreover, charge cards now faces even stronger ...

2019 saw strong growth in most categories of financial cards and payments, with specific reasons in each category for the increases seen in the numbers of cards in circulation and transactions value. In debit cards, the increasingly liberal attitude ...

Statistics recently published by the Saudi Arabian Monetary Authority (SAMA) revealed a substantial increase in the volume of transactions being cleared by the Saudi Payments Network (Mada). More specifically, a 45% increase was registered in the ...

Owing to tight budgets and typically large family sizes in Saudi Arabia, consumers are tending to prefer products with multipack offers or discounts on large pack sizes. In response to this demand, manufacturers have focused on promotions such as two...

Saudization continues to have an influence over numerous economic sectors in the Kingdom as the government seeks to diversify its income streams and reduce its reliance on oil and gas exports. This has led to numerous expats leaving the country, ...

2019 saw the Saudi Arabian economy recover somewhat from its recent slump and the IMF predicts 2.9% economic growth over the course of the year. This follows the 2.2% economic growth registered in 2018, a major improvement on the contraction ...

Changing consumer lifestyles and government efforts to diversify the economy and create jobs for locals are influencing the development of packaging in Saudi Arabia. The end of the review period saw Saudi Arabia suffer an economic slowdown as a ...

The Middle East and Africa (MEA) is home to greatly differing economies, with the countries of the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) being among the richest globally in terms of GDP per capita, while many Sub-Saharan markets belong to the poorest ...

Analgesics continued to see good sales over 2019 thanks to the 2018 ban on selling antibiotics without a prescription. As a result, Saudi consumers continued to use more analgesics whenever they experience pain whether it is due to headaches, fever ...

Prices rises continued to occur over 2019 which further dampened sales of cough, cold and allergy (hay fever) remedies in Saudi Arabia in 2019. Consumers stopped buying as many products as they sought to absorb prices rises on the back of the ...

Dermatologicals continued to suffer from higher prices in 2019 due to the introduction of VAT in 2018 that served to dampen sales for many products in the category. In addition, the decrease in expatriate numbers in Saudi Arabia means that the ...

Consumers continue to find prices for dietary supplements high in 2019 particularly as consumers continue to struggle with higher prices in the country after the introduction of VAT over 2017-2018. In addition, prices for dietary supplements are not ...