Saudi Arabia: Over 50,000 employees quit in Q1

Cairo: Around 50,826 employees, mostly Saudi nationals, quit their jobs in the kingdom in the first quarter of this year, a Saudi newspaper reported, citing government figures.

The figure accounted for 36 per cent of the overall workers who stopped subscribing to the insurance system during the cited period.

In a breakdown, Al Eqtisadiah reported that male employees accounted for 28,291 or 55.6 per cent of the total of those who resigned in the first quarter, while the remaining 22,535 were females.

Moreover, Saudis made up 98.5 per cent or 50,042 of the total workers who quit their jobs, including 27,792 males and 22,250 females. The rest were expatriates.

The causes of the resignations were not given.

In late 2020, Saudi Arabia, home to a large community of migrant workers, disclosed labour reforms, drastically revamping the country’s sponsorship system. Millions of migrant workers benefitted from the reforms, which came into effect in March 2021.

These reforms allow job mobility and regulate the exit and re-entry visa issuance for expatriate workers without employers’ approval.

Employee mobility allows expatriate workers to transfer between employers upon the expiry of the binding work contract without the employer’s consent.

In recent years, the kingdom has also launched a series of initiatives to employ its nationals and replace foreign workers in several fields including education, telecommunications and real estate as part of a labour policy known as “Saudisation”.

In mid-2022, ministerial decrees were announced restricting jobs in certain sectors to Saudis only. They covered optics professions, customer services, licensed aviation professions, including co-pilots and air controllers, sales outlets and periodic checks of cars.

In December, another decree localising employment for postal services and parcel transport across the country went into effect.

Saudi Arabia is also implementing a regional employment programme for its nationals.