Dr. Nasser Saidi’s comments appeared an article titled “The Middle East is already wracked by war. Now it must confront the coronavirus, too” that appeared in the Washington Post on 16th Mar 2020.
Comments from the article are posted below. The full article can be accessed here.
Oil producers in the Persian Gulf countries will be forced to cut back spending, and countries elsewhere that depend on remittances from expatriates in the gulf region will also suffer, said Nasser Saidi, a Dubai-based economist and former Lebanese finance minister.
Lebanon is in the throes of a financial crisis that has seen its currency collapse amid widespread street protests. Iraq, which depends on oil for almost all its income, will be badly hit at a time when political protests there have rocked the country.
The region will almost certainly slide into recession, Saidi said.
“It means unemployment will get worse. It means socioeconomic conditions will deteriorate. There will be more distress, more social problems and more political protests,” he said. “It’s not a pretty picture for the Middle East.”
Comments on the economic impact from Covid19 in Washington Post, 16 Mar 2020
17 March, 2020
read < 1 minute
Read Next
TV and radio
Bloomberg’s Horizons Middle East & Africa Interview, 17 Jul 2024
Aathira Prasad joined Joumanna Bercetche on 22nd July, 2024 as part of the Horizons Middle
18 July, 2024
media page
“A GCC spaceport could bring galactic gains”, Op-ed in Arabian Gulf Business Insight (AGBI), 4 Jul 2024
The opinion piece titled “A GCC spaceport could bring galactic gains” was published in the
5 July, 2024
media page
“Central Bank Digital Currencies: Will they replace the cash in our wallets?”, Op-ed in The National, 30 Jun 2024
The article titled “Central Bank Digital Currencies: Will they replace the cash in our wallets?”
30 June, 2024