Saudi scholar encourages inclusion for recovery

The global community needs sustainable, balanced and inclusive measures to reinstate and enrich economic growth, and countries should learn from each other to overcome challenges, a prestigious scholar from Saudi Arabia said at the Global Think Tank Webinar on Wednesday.

Due to many aspects of the world's economic and social environment being hit by the pandemic, Fahad Alturki, vice-president of research at the King Abdullah Petroleum Studies and Research Center, or KAPSARC, said major economies such as those in the G20 must strengthen unity and cooperation to send powerful signals of joint response, supporting both developing economies and the least-developed countries.

Alturki said effective measures proposed by various governments can be instructive to others. Policy makers should help people in need and put economic growth and society on the right track.

Under such circumstances, governments' fiscal deployment needs to be forward-looking, and needs to enhance social and economic resilience to deal with future crises, he added.

The scholar said at this critical moment, G20 economies should put aside their differences, coordinate action and demonstrate international cooperation to fight the COVID-19 pandemic, and their actions will provide confidence and hope for the global response.

To assist the country's battle against the contagion, KAPSARC has collected and compiled over 50,000 data records from Saudi Arabia's Ministry of Health reports on the COVID-19 situation in the country.