الشورى يسرّع مناقشة «التقارير» قبل الإجازة السنوية

The Shura Council discussed, in its thirty-seventh regular session of the first year of the ninth term, chaired by the Deputy Chairman of the Council, Dr. Mishal Fahm Al-Sulami, the annual report of the National Center for Inspection and Control. The National Center for Palm and Dates called for coordination with relevant entities to encourage the industrial sector to invest in recycling palm waste. The Council also discussed the annual report of the General Entertainment Authority, and Dr. Amal Al-Sheikh urged the General Entertainment Authority to rely on modern and advanced technologies to measure beneficiary satisfaction in line with global standards to enhance service quality and achieve the best results. Council member Osama Al-Rabiah called on the authority to develop a timeline to expand coverage to all regions, in cooperation with the public and private sectors, to achieve local development, enrich the lifestyle, and stimulate investment. The Shura Council expedited the discussion of reports from the service sectors before members enjoyed their annual vacation.

Al-Najjar: A National Program to Empower Date Palm Farmers

Council member Dr. Abdullah Omar Al-Najjar proposed to the National Center for Palm and Dates, in coordination with relevant entities, to adopt the launch of a national empowerment program for date palm farmers, aimed at increasing the productivity and marketing efficiency of date palm farmers in various regions of the Kingdom, and enhancing the sustainability of the date palm sector to achieve the objectives of the Kingdom's Vision 2030. Adopting this program contributes to developing the capabilities of date palm farmers and enabling them to transition to a professional agricultural business model, improving the quality of Saudi dates and enhancing their competitiveness in global markets, supporting food security, improving the quality of life in agricultural communities, and accelerating the pace of economic transformation in the agricultural sector to serve sustainable national development. He emphasized the importance of enabling small date palm farmers to enter the market in a collective and organized manner by establishing flexible marketing alliances that connect them with local, regional, and international markets, providing them with vital services such as: packaging, sorting, classification, and labeling, under the supervision of the National Center for Palm and Dates and in cooperation with licensed cooperative and community associations related to the agricultural sector. He also suggested adopting a unified quality mark for date palm alliances, which would be granted to farmers who adhere to packaging and sorting standards with a certified certificate, or any trademark used in local markets or for export, thereby contributing to increasing the market value of the product and enhancing its competitiveness. To expand the reach, developing a unified electronic platform for marketing agricultural alliance products inside and outside the Kingdom would be a true support for this direction and achieve a qualitative leap in marketing Saudi dates.

Al-Najjar called for launching a marketing alliances program for dates to enable small date palm farmers to access markets in an organized manner by linking them with sorting, packaging, and distribution centers, and providing a supportive institutional framework that contributes to improving product quality and enhancing its competitiveness.

Al-Bouainain to the Red Sea Authority: Expand the Scope to All Coasts

Council member Fadl Al-Bouainain emphasized the importance of the regulatory, legislative, strategic, and investment role played by the Red Sea Authority, which has reflected its outputs on marine tourism in the coasts and territorial waters of Saudi Arabia. He called for expanding the geographical scope currently assigned to it to include building and organizing coastal tourism in the Arabian Gulf.

The challenges facing marine tourism in the Eastern Province cities overlooking the Arabian Gulf are no different from those faced by their counterparts in the Red Sea, which necessitates achieving comprehensive work for the authority, especially since the authority's regulations and systems are a reflection of international regulations related to marine tourism and beach management, making them applicable to the coasts of the Red Sea and the Arabian Gulf.

He pointed out that a fruitful tourism economy is not limited to the Red Sea coast, but can also be applied to the Arabian Gulf coast to maximize the gains of the national economy, enhance the competitiveness of coastal cities, and achieve one of the most important objectives of the vision, which is to improve the quality of life for citizens and residents alike. It is also important to unify the legislation and regulations related to marine tourism, coastal areas, and tourist islands in the Kingdom, in a way that enhances the integration of the legislative framework, its comprehensiveness, and its ability to stimulate investments, build tourism projects, and attract foreign investments, while simultaneously limiting the existence of substantial differences in the regulations applied to the marine tourism system in the Kingdom, and expanding the scope of work and supervision of the Saudi Red Sea Authority to include the Red Sea and the Arabian Gulf.