Knowledge Economy and its Implications in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia

Abstract

A knowledge-based economy can be defined as the economy that has the capability of effectively producing, sharing, disseminating and utilizing knowledge for sustainable economic development. In the current digital age, knowledge is a key factor in economic growth, creation of wealth, globalization, job creation, entrepreneurship development, sharing and storing knowledge with the help of ICT in order to make better informed decisions to increase productivity and efficiency in the organizations. It also helps to improve the GDP of the nations. It also emphasizes the fact that intellectual capital of a nation is the key driver of creativity and innovation with reliance on information and communication technology as an enabler. The past decade in Saudi Arabia has witnessed a shift in the vision, focus, motivation, approaches and initiatives taken by the country towards achieving sustainable economic development. The Kingdom is advancing towards diversified knowledge-driven economy. Moreover, the country is focused on technology transfer in order to compensate for paucity of various indigenous technological capacities. Various national development plans launched by the Saudi Government will positively impact the GDP and the exports of the country. All these plans are under the umbrella of Vision 2030 which is an extensive approach of Saudi Arabia to move from oil-based economy to Knowledge-based economy. The aim of this research is to understand the positive implications of introducing knowledge-economy in the KSA. The methodology used in this research is quantitative in nature. Primary data was collected with the help of a pilot project based on best practices on knowledge management adopted by Saudi Aramco. The results concluded that knowledge economy has become prominent source of diversification of the economy in the KSA.

Keywords: Knowledge Management, knowledge economy, knowledge sharing, knowledge application, economic development

JEL Classification: M00, M10, M19, M39, O00